Better late than never

Threat of blacklisting by FATF has produced results

There is something of a sense of the stable door being shut after the horse has bolted about the reports that a currency market in Peshawar has been shut down which had been linked to money laundering; and the notification of a Counter-Terrorism Financing Unit (CTFU). As with so much in the grey and murky world of terror and extremism financing there has been foot-dragging on the part of assorted governments of Pakistan provincial and federal, and it is only the spur of action by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) that has pushed them to action.

The threat of blacklisting by the FATF in the event of failing to comply with its requirements has produced results, but the point to be made is that results could have been produced so much earlier and without the Damoclean sword of blacklisting had the political will been there — which it was not. The springing up of a CTFU in Khyber-Pakhtunkhwa is post hoc, and the mechanisms by which terror financing is enabled are not going to be much affected by the closing down of a single currency exchange. The Standard Operating Procedures now before the public are to address what the FATF in June 2018 termed ‘strategic deficiencies’ in the national ability to prevent terror financing and the money laundering that goes to underpin terror activities.

Unless Pakistan is clearly seen to be taking pre-emptive measures then the FATF blacklist beckons and with that the possibility of economic sanctions and other financial inconveniences. However, it is good to know that measures are now in place in K-P and that officers have been appropriately trained. There has been action — 80 cases have been registered and 112 suspects arrested which is all well and good — but there is yet to emerge that elusive national counter-terrorism narrative that has been talked of to little effective outcome. Unless and until the mindset that allows extremism to flower into terrorism is addressed then the canker will persist. Hearts and minds are hard to change.

Published in The Express Tribune, September 20^th, 2018.

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