Nepal Ratifies UN Convention for the Suppression of Financing of Terrorism

Nepal on Friday ratified the International Convention for the Suppression of the Financing of Terrorism, 1999, and the International Convention against Transnational Organized Crime, averting the risk of being blacklisted in the international financial market.

A parliament meeting held on Friday ratified the conventions tabled by Deputy Prime Minister and Finance Minister Bharat Mohan Adhikari by majority voting as the former rebel party, UCPN (Maoist), demanded that the convention be ratified only after clarifying the wordings ´organized crime´ mentioned in the convention.

The conventions were ratified with some reservations as demanded by ruling Maoists and the CPN-UML parties.

Friday marked the deadline given by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), the global body overseeing anti-money laundering, to the government to ratify the conventions. The global body could have blacklisted the country had the parliament failed to ratify the conventions by Friday. International community would have also stopped carrying out financial transaction with Nepal in such a situation.

Nepal was required to ratify three UN conventions and four Acts related to anti-money laundering (AML) and controlling of terrorism financing by 2010 as per the commitments made in international forums. But the country repeatedly missed deadlines due to prolonged political transition.

Source: Asian Tribune