Crypto assets should not be granted official currency or legal tender status, the much-awaited synthesis paper by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) and Financial Stability Board (FSB) has said ahead of the G20 leadership summit under India's presidency. However, the report has argued against a blanket ban on activities linked to crypto assets, explaining that such a move can be costly as well as technically demanding to enforce. Central banks should avoid holding crypto assets in their official reserve as they pose a risk to monetary and global financial stability, according to the synthesis paper.
Pakistan has improved its full compliance on only two of the 40 FATF recommendations, the APG report noted.
Seeking to wriggle out of the FATF's grey list, Pakistan has imposed tough financial sanctions on 88 banned terror groups and their leaders, including Hafiz Saeed, Masood Azhar and Dawood Ibrahim, by ordering the seizure of all of their properties and freezing of bank accounts, a media report said.
The Supreme Court on Thursday extended Mishra's tenure till the midnight of September 15 in larger "public and national interest", after the Centre asserted that his continuity is necessary in view of the ongoing FATF peer review and attempts by India's neighbours to ensure that the country gets into the "grey" list.
The FATF continuing Pakistan in the 'Grey' list means its downgrading by IMF, World Bank, ADB, EU and also a reduction in risk rating by Moody's, S&P and Fitch.
The list in 2018 contained about 7,600 names. It has been reduced to under 3,800 in the past 18 months, according to Castellum.AI, a New York-based regulatory technology company. About 1,800 of the names have been removed since the beginning of March, according to data collected by Castellum.
According to the new proposals, resident promoters or a foreign promoter from a FATF jurisdiction can set up a market infrastructure institution.
Pakistan is on the verge of strong action by FATF, given its inadequate performance, whereby it managed to pass in only six of 27 items, an official privy to the development said.
A three-judge bench headed by Justice Sanjay Kishan Kaul was hearing the pleas seeking reconsideration of the July 27, 2022 verdict by a three-judge bench on certain parameters.
Muraleedharan said that terrorist groups such as Al-Shabaab have put in place elaborate revenue collection networks, to support their terrorist activities.
MEA spokesperson Anurag Srivastava said Pakistani forces have continued to engage in unprovoked ceasefire violations, often from civilian areas, to support infiltration of terrorists across the LoC.
The Supreme Court said on Wednesday that money laundering is a "heinous" crime which not only affects the social and economic fabric of a nation but also tends to promote other serious offences like terrorism and drug trafficking.
China has put a hold on a proposal moved at the United Nations by the United States and co-supported by India to designate Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) terrorist Sajid Mir, one of India's most wanted terrorists and the main handler of the deadly 2008 Mumbai attacks, as a global terrorist.
India has hit out at China for blocking a move to designate Pakistan-based LeT leader Sajid Mir as a "global terrorist" by the UN, saying it shows a lack of genuine political will to fight the scourge of terrorism.
A dossier will be given to the FATF, an international terror financing watchdog.
He also said that terrorists are constantly finding new ways to carry out violence, radicalise youth and raise financial resources and the darknet is being used by terrorists to spread radical content and conceal their identities.
Dawood Ibrahim is wanted in India to face the law of the land for carrying out serial blasts in Mumbai in 1993 in which scores of people were killed and injured.
Market observers also said the approvals depended a lot on the funds themselves, and the extent to which they followed the new norms introduced last year.
The sentencing of Saeed came just four days ahead of a meeting of global anti-terror watchdog Financial Action Task Force in Paris to review Pakistan's compliance of an action plan prescribed by it to contain terror groups in the country.
In the audio clip, he is heard directing the attack on Chabad House during Mumbai 26/11 terror attacks.
The Anti-Terrorism Court (ATC) Gujranwala issued the warrant during a hearing in a terror financing case instituted by the Counter Terrorism Department (CTD) of Punjab police against some members of the JeM.
US Secretary of State Antony Blinken, in the 2020 Country Reports on Terrorism issued on Thursday, said that regionally, terrorist groups continued to operate from Pakistan.
The RBI is of the view that it cannot carry out satisfactory due diligence for granting registration because the funding is from a jurisdiction that has been identified by FATF as having weak measures to combat money laundering and terrorist financing.
"There are floods. Large number of leaders try to portray militant groups in a good way. A number of militant groups have sent their elements to Balochistan and Sindh for helping people affected by floods," Lt Gen Singh said.
It is learnt that China placed a hold on the proposal by India and the US to designate Mahmood as a global terrorist under the 1267 Al Qaeda Sanctions Committee of the UN Security Council.
Indian Army has taken the initiative to induct women in rank and file, and the first batch of 100 women soldiers is undergoing training at Corps of Military Police Centre and School, he said.
India handed over a dossier to Pakistan to take action against the JeM, as pressure mounted on Islamabad to take action against individual and organisation listed by the UN Security Council as terrorists.
The US State Department, in its Congressional mandated annual Country Reports on Terrorism for the year 2018, on Friday said even though the Pakistani government voiced support for political reconciliation between the Afghan government and the Taliban, it did not restrict the terror group and the Haqqani Network from operating in Pakistan-based safe havens and threatening the US and Afghan forces in Afghanistan.
'If the US intention was to use the FATF platform to isolate Pakistan and impose sanctions against it, that is not going to work when influential countries such as Turkey, Iran, Saudi Arabia, China and Russia will not lend support to the US campaign,' says Ambassador M K Bhadrakumar.
Hafiz Talha Saeed is a senior leader of the LeT and is the head of the cleric wing of the terrorist organisation.
Sources stated that a discussion is likely on the changed geopolitical situation in wake of the Taliban taking over Afghanistan and the drawdown of the US forces from the region.
Munir was among those in Pakistan who oversaw the 2019 Pulwama terror attack, according to Tilak Devasher, a member of the National Security Advisory Board (NSAB) and who retired as Special Secretary, Cabinet Secretariat.
India has evidence that social media platforms are being used to raise terror funds, NIA director general Dinkar Gupta said on Thursday, underlining that the issue will be deliberated during a two-day international ministerial conference on countering terror financing.
The court sentenced Saeed to five-and-a-half years and imposed a fine of Rs 15,000 in each case. The sentences of both cases will run concurrently.
External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said the passage of the amendment will strengthen India's national security and its global position.
In the document, the global body expressed concerns over the increasing use of Internet and other information and communications technologies, including social media platforms, for terrorist purposes.
Former India opener and BJP MP Gautam Gambhir on Friday said that there should not be any relation with Pakistan till cross-border terrorism gets over.
Being part of category-I implies lower compliance burden, simplified know-your-customer norms and documentation requirements, and fewer investment restrictions.
Banks have raised concerns over the new international trade settlement in rupee, fearing that facilitation of such a mechanism could result in them facing the ire of economic sanctions by the West, people aware of the matter said. Large banks with overseas operations have sought clarity and assurance from the Reserve Bank of India (RBI) that they will not be targeted with sanctions for facilitating rupee trade with a sanction-hit country such as Russia. The present payment mechanism is a shift from earlier such arrangements, like the one with sanction-hit Iran, which involved banks facilitating settlement of international trade that did not have business in the sanctioned nation.
In a major boost to measures being taken by India against money laundering and terror financing activities, the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) on Wednesday said the country has substantially addressed the deficiencies in its regulatory framework and has become largely compliant with global standards in this regard.
