Of the 40 parameters, Pakistan has made progress in about 21 and been downgraded on 1, the APG’s Mutual Evaluation Report (MER) published on June 4 said, adding that this meant Pakistan moves ‘up’ one category in its evaluation at the APG. “Pakistan will move from enhanced [expedited] to enhanced follow-up, and will continue to report back to the APG on progress to strengthen its implementation of AML/CFT laws. Pakistan submitted its third progress report in February 2021,” said the APG’s report that was presented to the group in May 2021, which noted that Pakistan had passed a number of new laws in the last few months that made its systems more compliant on these issues. Significantly, the APG’s meeting last month, which included India, also retained Bhutan on the “enhanced follow-up” list, with 29 of 40 recommendations being rated as compliant or largely compliant. In particular, Pakistan’s inability to end funding to U.N. Security Council designated terror groups and entities including the Haqqani group, the al-Qaeda, the Lashkar-e-Toiba and the Jaish-e-Mohammad, and prosecute their leadership successfully had held up its ratings.

Source: The Hindu June 05, 2021 08:04 UTC