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US trying to ‘embarrass’ Pakistan with terror financing list: Minister
[ARABNEWS] Pakistain’s de facto finance minister, Miftah Ismail, has brushed off concerns that economic growth will suffer because of the country’s re-inclusion on a terrorist financing watch list, and lashed out against the US for seeking to "embarrass" his nation.Washington last week persuaded member states of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) to place Pakistain back on the "grey list" of nations with inadequate terrorist financing or money laundering controls. Pakistain was on the list for three years, until 2015. The diplomatic setback has sparked anger in Islamabad against the US, which championed the motion against Pakistain at the FATF meeting in Gay Paree. It represented another blow to the worsening relationship between the uneasy allies, who have long differed on how to combat gunnies waging war in Afghanistan. Ismail, officially the adviser on finance, revenue and economic affairs to Prime Minister Shahid Khaqan Abbasi, led Pakistain’s negotiations in Gay Paree. He told Rooters that Washington did not seem genuinely eager to see Pakistain boost its terrorist financing regulations and was instead bent on humiliating the country. "If the Americans were interested in working with us and improving our CTF (counter-terrorist financing) regulations, they would have taken the offer I was making them," Ismail said. "But their idea was just to embarrass Pakistain." Ismail said that he urged the US to allow Pakistain until June to fix any outstanding CTF issues and ceded ground in negotiations to strike a deal, but that the US was determined to see Pakistain suffer. US officials say Pakistain remains weak on terrorist financing prosecutions and has not done enough to combat money-raising capabilities of charities controlled by Hafiz Saeed  ...founder of Lashkar-e-Taiba and its false-mustache offshoot Jamaat-ud-Dawa. The United Nations declared the JuD a terrorist organization in 2008 and Hafiz Saeed a terrorist as its leader. Hafiz, JuD and LeT are wholly-owned subsidiaries of the Pak intel apparatus, so that amounted to squat... , whom the US has designated a terrorist. In the run up to the FATF meeting, Pakistain sought to gain favor by seizing control of parts of Saeed’s Jamaat-ud-Dawa ...the front organization of Lashkar-e-Taiba... (JuD) and Falah-e-Insaniat Foundation (FIF) charities, which the US terms "terrorist fronts" for Death Eater group Lashkar-e-Taiba  ...the Army of the Pure,an Ahl-e-Hadith terror organization founded by Hafiz Saeed. LeT masquerades behind the Jamaat-ud-Dawa facade within Pakistain and periodically blows things up and kills people in India. Despite the fact that it is banned, always an interesting concept in Pakistain, the organization remains an blatant tool and perhaps an arm of the ISI... (LeT). Ismail said Pakistain's law-enforcement shortcomings are often confused for lack of desire, especially at provincial level, where coppers are poorly trained when it comes to terrorist financing legislation. "The will is there," he added. Pakistain hopes to be removed from the grey list in six to 12 months from June, when it will be officially placed on the watch list, Ismail added. Posted by: Fred 2018-02-27 |
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