NA passes two FATF-related bills amid protest
The Anti-terrorism (Amendment) Bill, 2020 and The United Nations (Security Council) (Amendment) Bill, 2020 sailed through the lower house of the parliament. PHOTO: APP/FILE
The National Assembly on Wednesday passed two government sponsored bills – the United Nations Security Council (Amendment) Bill, 2020, and the Anti-Terrorism (Amendment) Bill, 2020 – with a majority vote amid a loud protest by opposition parties.
Both the bills aim at fulfilling various requirements of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) – an inter-governmental organization that sets global policies against money laundering and terror financing.
Pakistan, which was placed on the FATF grey list in June 2019, is supposed to fulfill the body’s 27-point action plan in order to come out of its grey list and to avoid its blacklist of non-compliant countries.
The proposed legislations seek to empower the federal government to direct authorities to implement various measures in the light of the United Nations Security Council (UNSC) resolutions.
These measures include freezing and seizure of assets, travel ban, and arms embargo on the entities and individuals, who are designated on the sanctions list of the United Nations.
During the voting for the bills, the opposition protested saying they were not given a chance to speak after Foreign Minister Shah Mahmood Qureshi on Tuesday accused them of linking the FATF-related bills with 35 proposed amendments in the National Accountability Bureau (NAB) Ordinance, 1999.
Taking the floor on Tuesday, the foreign minister – while explaining the deadlock between the government and the opposition – implied that the opposition would lend its support to the bills only if the government took up the FAFT and NAB amendments together.
Addressing the house on Wednesday, PML-N’s Khawaja Asif rejected Qureshi’s claim and said that both the bills related to the FATF were passed with consensus and proposed amendments in NAB law was never used as leverage to get some concessions. “We don’t need any concessions,” he said.
Asif said the National Assembly speaker had formed a parliamentary committee to discuss the upcoming bills and an informal committee was also formed to build consensus over the bills. It was decided that once a consensus is reached, the bills will be presented before the parliamentary committee.