Nepal escapes possibility of blacklisting for three months

Nepal escaped possibility of blacklisting by the Financial Action task Force (FATF) for another three months as the Legislature Parliament today ratified two key UN Conventions to check the flow of dirty money.
"The passing of International Convention for the Suppression of the Financing of Terrorism-1999 and UN Convention Against Transnational Organised Crime from the parliament has upgraded Nepal's status," said a member, who returned from the Mexico meeting on Nepal's review today.
Nepal that was under high risk country in the FATF's -- a global anti-money laundering agency -- ranking now is upgraded to 'review under monitor' status till November.
However, Nepal has to now pass remaining two bills – Mutual Legal Assistance Bill and Extradition Bill -- and bring some infeastructural reforms by November, when the FATF meeting will again review Nepal's progress.
Central bank governor Dr Yubraj Khatiwada, law secretary Madhav Poudel and joint secretary at the Finance Ministry Mahendra Man Gurung left for Mexico on June 18 to take part in the plenary sessions of joint FATF. The governor appraised International Cooperation Review Group undear FATF on Nepal's progress and took part with other 35 member states to discuss on progress on Anti-Money Laundering in their respective countries.
Earlier, the intra-party feud in the UCPN-Maoist has delayed the ratification of the UN Conventions.
Due to the rift in UCPN-Maoists Finance Minister Bharat Mohan Adhikari registered both the conventions at the parliamentary secretariat as Home Minister Krishna Bahadur Mahara refused to register UN Convention Against Transnational Organised Crime.
A country has to fulfill 40 plus nine special recommendations of Financial Action Task Force to comply with the international Anti-Money Laundering practice.
Earlier, the regional review meeting of FATF in Macau on May 13 had asked Nepal to submit the progress report by June 21 before its plenary takes place on June 20-24 in Mexico. Nepal had in the Macau meeting also requested for deadline extension to meet the requirements as the country is passing through transitional period.
The FATF has forty plus nine special recommendations for the countries to comply not to be black listed. Of them, the nine special recommendations are aimed at checking terrorist financing.
In the evening, the House today ratified the conventions by an overwhelming majority, though three Constituent Assembly (CA) members of Nepal Workers and Peasants’ Party voted against the conventions.
The UCPN-Maoists had filed two amendment proposals this morning seeking reservations on the part of definition of 'terrorism' and 'organised crime' of the convention, the party withdrew it afterwards.
UCPN-Maoists CA member Ekraj Bhandari had filed amendment proposals seeking to add 'No acts related to political activities will be taken as criminal activity and organised crime' in Article 2 of both the conventions but the Convention has no room to add any amendments. "But it could be addressed UCPN-Maoists concerns in the Act," said Adhikari.
A section in the UCPN-M was against ratifying the conventions fearing that the party’s activities — during a decade-long insurgency and in future — might come under scrutiny.
An amendment proposal seeking reservation on Article 24 of the first convention, filed by CPN-UML lawmaker Ushakala Rai, was, however, passed.