Pak remains on FATF ‘Grey List’

Barring Turkey and Malaysia, no country in the world is agreeable to any of the proposals from anywhere especially at world forums to bail out Pakistan from out of undeclared international isolation. Pakistan is confronted with a chronic economic crises where common masses are agitated over their continued suffering due to record high inflation and consequential spine breaking high prices of basic consumer goods. It is chiefly also because of the fact that Pakistan has not been getting any loans or funds from any designated International Agency. On the other hand, despite that it has not stopped getting actively involved in promoting and encouraging terror and is known as epicentre of global terrorism. It may be recalled that recently Paris based Financial Action Task Force (FATF) was about to put Pakistan under the category of “Black Listed” ones which could have meant freezing of all capital inflows in Pakistan. The International Monetary Fund had already given such indications . It may be re called that last year in October , FATF had warned Pakistan to drastically change its policy towards funding and supporting terrorism and had therefore put it on ”Grey List” . Pakistan may feign hard that it had abstained from funding by way of checking flow of money to terror groups but looking to the reports pouring in from different confirmed sources, Lashkar-e- Toiba and Jaish-e- Mohammed continued to have channels of finance patronised by Pakistan.
The global watchdog , however, has tightened its standards on terrorist financing which has helped contain access to funds for groups such as Al-Qaida etc but there were many groups which continued to benefit from funds raised through illegal activity. It finds Pakistan fully or close to fully non- compliant on majority of 27 targets of the Action Plan. However, another chance stands given to it to mend its ways and review its policy towards being soft on terror patronage by giving it four more months so that it registered full compliance with the said 27 points Action Plan . Agreed timelines, however, have continuously been flouted by it in this respect and in the light of the terror financing risks emanating from its jurisdiction , no lenient view could be taken by the FATF. Pakistan should be however content with the fact that it did not plunge into the category of “Black Listed” country like North Korea and Iran. It has therefore been asked to “continue” to address its strategic deficiencies and definitely try to achieve cent percent compliance by June 2020.
The question is whether Pakistan could throw off its state policy to promote terror as the bogey of Kashmir which it has been raking up for the last 72 years is foolishly thought by it to help its cause by manufacturing terrorism and sending terrorists to Kashmir, Afghanistan and other places to create large scale violence. In Kashmir, however, despite regularly indulging in acts of infiltration and border violations , it is desperately watching that infiltrators were routinely getting killed and the impact of indoctrinated , trained and funded militants’ writ had waned and was racing towards ultimate end. Domestic compulsions and the ingrained policy of promoting terrorism had been an inalienable part of the Pakistani dispensations and establishment ever since it came into being. FATF has , as such, found that still several terror groups continued to benefit from funds raised through illegal activities and from supporters scattered in different countries.
FATF has also found that terrorists use various methods to launder money which includes social media and are constantly in hunt for new followers for financing . The targets of these terrorists continued to be individuals sympathetic to humanitarian causes or “vulnerable to violent messaging “. However, India being the victim for more than three decades of Pakistan sponsored terrorism shall continue to lobby against Pakistan getting any reprieve from the global watchdog as India is a member of FATF consultations and its Asia Pacific Group.

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