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Financial Action Task Force (FATF) was established within the OECD in 1989 by G-7 countries (USA, Japan, Germany, France, UK, Italy and Canada) to prevent money laundering internationally. FATF, which included the fight against terrorist financing in its vision after September 11, 2001, currently has a total of 39 members, including 37 countries and 2 regional organizations. Türkiye became a member of FATF on 24 September 1991.
FATF periodically inspects and evaluates member countries in terms of their progress in preventing money laundering and terrorist financing. FATF, which has evaluated member countries three times so far, realizes the fourth tour continues through its mutual evaluations.
There is a tracking mechanism to monitor the progress of countries with significant compliance gaps within the framework of FATF's technical harmonization and effectiveness standards. Within the framework of the results of the mutual evaluation report, countries can be procedurally included in a monitoring period that will last 16 months; at the end of the period, it is followed by the International Cooperation Review Group (ICRG), a working group within the FATF. Within the framework of the results of the Post Observation Period Report (POPR) prepared for the country at the end of the monitoring period, it may be adopted that the countries be subjected to Enhanced Monitoring by FATF within a certain Action Plan. Countries subject to increased monitoring are monitored by the FATF within the "grey list”.(*)
During the General Assembly held in Singapore on June 2024, Turkey has been removed from the grey list. It is stated that:
“The FATF welcomes Türkiye’s significant progress in improving its AML/CFT regime. Türkiye strengthened the effectiveness of its AML/CFT regime to meet the commitments in its action plan regarding the strategic deficiencies that the FATF identified in October 2021 including;
(1) dedicating more resources at the FIU to supervision of AML/CFT compliance by high-risk sectors and increasing on-site inspections overall; (2) applying dissuasive sanctions for AML/CFT breaches, in particular for unregistered money transfer services and exchange offices and in relation to the requirements of adequate, accurate, and up-to-date beneficial ownership information; (3) enhancing the use of financial intelligence to support ML investigations and increasing proactive disseminations by the FIU; (4) undertaking more complex money laundering investigations and prosecutions; (5) setting out clear responsibilities and measurable performance objectives and metrics for the authorities responsible for recovering criminal assets and pursuing terrorism financing cases and using statistics to update risk assessments and inform policy; (6) conducting more financial investigations in terrorism cases, prioritizing TF investigations and prosecutions related to UN-designated groups and ensuring TF investigations are extended to identify financing and support networks; (7) concerning targeted financial sanctions, pursuing outgoing requests and domestic designations related to UN-designated groups, in line with Turkey’s risk profile; (8) implementing a risk-based approach to oversight of non-profit organisations to prevent their abuse for terrorist financing, conducting outreach to a broad range of NPOs in the sector and engaging with their feedback, ensuring that sanctions applied are proportionate to any violations, and taking steps to ensure that supervision does not disrupt or discourage legitimate NPO activity, such as fundraising. Türkiye is therefore no longer subject to the FATF’s increased monitoring process.”(**)
Reference/ Citation
* https://masak.hmb.gov.tr/mali-eylem-gorev-gucu
