Mongolia will be removed from the Financial Action Task Force (FATF)’s grey list within 2020, said the Bank of Mongolia (BoM). Mongolia has been included on a list of countries monitored by an international agency that polices anti-money laundering activities and terrorism financing couple of weeks earlier.Erdembbileg Ochirkhuu, First Deputy Governor of BoM stated that Mongolia will not have serious problems such as delaying foreign settlements due to the watch list. He said, “We are working with a plan to get out of greylist in 2020. The four indicators of FATF’s recommendation that have been evaluated as unsatisfactory can be improved in the short-term. Also, payment and transaction fee has not increased since the inclusion in greylist. FATF’s International Co-operation Review Group (ICRG) has already completed Mongolia’s risk evaluation in 2017.”During the FATF Plenary and Working Group meetings took place in Paris, Mongolia pledged to implement its action plan, including improving sectoral money laundering and terrorist financing risk understanding by Designated Non-Financial Business or Profession (DNFBP) supervisors, applying a riskbased approach to supervision, demonstrating increased inves-tigations and prosecutions of different types of money laun-dering activity in line with identified risks and applying effective, proportionate and dissua sive sanctions.“The grey list is not a bank debt issue. The FATF evaluates the legal framework and system for detec ting money laundering and terrorism,” addressed Ayush Dunk huu, Director General of Bank of Mongolia’s Legal Department. According to the follow-up report to Mongolia’s assessment of anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist financing measures, the country has undertaken a number of secto ral assessments including for NBFIs since 2017 mutual eva luation report (MER). The risk assessments of real estate and terrorist financing (TF) are recognized as positive, though it is difficult to fully appreciate what an average or moderate rating for TF means in the context of Mongolia. The global body said Mongolia had taken steps to improve its cooperation in the fight against money laundering, but that it needs to do continue enhancing its legal framework through legis lative measures and guidance to be removed from the grey list.

Published Date:2019-10-29