Pakistan minister for probe into previous governments' failure in securing FATF membership

Pakistan's Human Rights minister on Tuesday demanded a probe into failure of past governments in getting FATF membership, saying India has been creating issues for long.

Paris-based anti-money laundering watchdog placed Pakistan on grey list in June 2018 and asked it to implement an action plan to address issue of money laundering and terror-financing.

Shireen Mazari told Parliament that it was criminal negligence that previous governments did t pursue membership of Financial Action Task Force (FATF) which was set up by G-7 countries in 1989 to curb money laundering.

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India became FATF member in 1998 and has been creating issues for Pakistan, she said.

"Parliament should conduct an investigation against specific members of bureaucracy, foreign ministers and institutional heads (of previous governments) for t applying for membership of FATF," she said.

minister accused that previous rulers were corrupt and involved in money laundering, so y avoided FATF membership.

Mazari was irked after reports that India was pushing to get Pakistan on blacklist of FATF. She said Pakistan's membership of FATF would have saved it from current troubles.

She also said that consular access agreement signed between Pakistan and India in 2008 was t registered in UN.

Mazari said that two countries agreed t to give consular access to spies and had it been registered with UN, International Court of Justice (ICJ) would t have taken cognizance of Indian plea regarding consular access to Kulbhushan Jadhav.

She demanded that probe should be launched for failure to register agreement with UN.

Mazari said unless a bilateral agreement is registered with UN, it is t accepted or recognised by international bodies. 

Outgoing Financial Action Task Force (FATF) president, Marshall Billingslea, on Tuesday hinted about possibility to blacklisting Pakistan after international financial watchdog's meeting in Paris.

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"Pakistan had 'significant' work to do. With regard to an action plan agreed in June 2018, y are 'lacking in almost every respect'," Billingslea said at a press briefing.

He added, "Pakistan was cautioned in February at plenary that y had missed almost all of ir January milestones. y were urged to t fail to meet milestones in May. Unfortunately, Pakistan has yet again missed its May milestones."

FATF has come down heavily on Pakistan for its "lack" of compliance with 26-point action plan prepared for Islamabad to demonstrate its sincerity in fighting terrorism.

(With PTI inputs)