The fact that Turkey is a republic that lives on the borderline of legality and international lawlessness is something that is known, especially after the notorious accident at Susurluk in the 90s. Because of this, Turkey, as well as some other countries, landed on the “black list” of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) in June since it has failed to adopt legislation on the prevention of the financing of terrorism.
FATF was established by the G-7 Summit that was held in Paris in 1989. Recognising the threat posed to the banking system and to financial institutions, the G-7 Heads of State or Government and President of the European Commission convened the Task Force from the G-7 member States, the European Commission and eight other countries. The Task Force was given the responsibility of examining money laundering techniques and trends, reviewing the action which had already been taken at a national or international level, and setting out the measures that still needed to be taken to combat money laundering. In April 1990, less than one year after its creation, the FATF issued a report containing a set of Forty Recommendations, which provide a comprehensive plan of action needed to fight against money laundering.
In addition to FATF's "Forty plus Nine" Recommendations, in 2000 FATF issued a list of "Non-Cooperative Countries or Territories" (NCCTs), commonly called the FATF Blacklist. This was a list of 15 jurisdictions that, for one reason or another, FATF members believed were uncooperative with other jurisdictions in international efforts against money laundering (and, later, terrorism financing). Typically, this lack of cooperation manifested itself as an unwillingness or inability (frequently, a legal inability) to provide foreign law enforcement officials with information relating to bank account and brokerage records, and customer identification and beneficial owner information relating to such bank and brokerage accounts, shell company, and other financial vehicles commonly used in money laundering. The FATF NCCT list is now defunct as the countries on it have made significant improvements in standards and cooperation.
The effect of the FATF Blacklist has been significant, and arguably has proven more important in international efforts against money laundering than has the FATF Recommendations. While, under international law, the FATF Blacklist carried with it no formal sanction, in reality, a jurisdiction placed on the FATF Blacklist often found itself under intense financial pressure.
The following is the outcome of the plenary meeting of FATF which was held in Rome, Italy on June 20-22, 2012.
The FATF took important new steps to protect the international financial system from abuse by:
- Producing two public documents as part of its ongoing work to identify jurisdictions that may pose a risk to the international financial system:
- FATF Public Statement on jurisdictions with strategic anti-money laundering and combating the financing of terrorism (AML/CFT) deficiencies.
- Improving Global AML/CFT Compliance: on-going process - Jurisdictions with strategic AML/CFT deficiencies for which they have developed an action plan with the FATF
- Receiving an update on progress made by Argentina and Turkmenistan
- Calling on Turkey to enact adequate counter terrorist financing legislation
- Reviewing the voluntary tax compliance programmes in Spain, Pakistan and Curaçao
- Publishing three reports which outline new methods and trends in money laundering and terrorist financing:
- Operational Issues – Financial investigations Guidance
- Specific Risk Factors in Laundering the Proceeds of Corruption
- Illicit Tobacco Trade
- Welcoming the Anti-Money Laundering Liaison Committee of the Franc Zone (CLAB) as an observer to the FATF
References
FATF
Wikipedia
article in Greek - defencenet
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