The United Arab Emirates is poised to be removed from the global financial crime watchdog’s “grey list” after making progress on compliance measures to combat money laundering while Panama has gone one step further and been dropped from the index.
The Paris-based Financial Action Task Force said on Friday that the UAE, the Gulf’s leading financial hub, had “substantially” introduced compliance measures needed for its removal from the multilateral body’s list of countries under enhanced monitoring.
Faft said the UAE had made progress in areas such as facilitating money-laundering investigations, imposing sanctions on non-compliance at financial institutions, and increasing prosecutions. The task force said it would therefore conduct on-site visits to verify that these changes would be sustained.
A successful inspection would provide a signal that the UAE, along with other jurisdictions such as Barbados, Gibraltar and Uganda, could be removed from the list at an upcoming plenary session in February.
On Friday Panama became one of several jurisdictions, including Albania, Jordan and the Cayman Islands, a British Overseas Territory, to be removed from the grey list altogether after their on-site visits proved successful.
This was good news for Panama’s beleaguered government, which has been trying to change its reputation as a haven for shady money by touting its green credentials similar to neighbouring Costa Rica.
