Himal Press 
KATHMANDU: The annual plenary meeting of the Asia Pacific Group on Money Laundering (APG) of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), held in Vancouver, Canada, on July 9-14, approved Nepal’s Mutual Evaluation Report.
The meeting also approved the mutual evaluations of Brunei and Laos, which were assessed this year along with Nepal.
Mutual evaluations are comprehensive country reports that analyze the implementation and effectiveness of measures to combat money laundering and terrorist financing. These reports provide a detailed description and analysis of a country’s system for preventing criminal abuse of the financial system and offer focused recommendations to strengthen its anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism financing measures.
The APG team visited Nepal in December last year to assess the country’s compliance with money laundering and terror financing norms. The mutual evaluations were prepared based on their findings during the visit.
During the plenary meeting, the findings and ratings in the mutual evaluations are discussed, and the final report is adopted. The report is then reviewed by the FATF Global Network for technical quality and consistency, after which it will be published on the FATF website. Following the adoption of the report, countries are required to address the identified shortcomings, and they are also subject to post-assessment monitoring.
Dev Kumar Dhakal, executive director of Nepal Rastra Bank (NRB), said that Nepal will be under observation for a year after the final report is published in October. During this observation period, Nepal will need to initiate several economic reforms. Whether Nepal will be placed on the ‘grey list’ will be determined by the reform measures implemented.
A team from NRB, led by Governor Maha Prasad Adhikari, attended the plenary meeting in Vancouver.
APG members and observers, including the Financial Action Taskforce, World Bank, International Monetary Fund, and UN Office on Drugs and Crimes, among others, participated in the plenary meeting.
