Foreign Ministry talks about its measures to remove Iraq from the list of money laundering

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Baghdad / Obelisk: The Ministry of Foreign Affairs explained, on Saturday January 16, 2021, its procedures to remove the name of Iraq from the list of money laundering and terrorist financing.

In a statement received by Al-Masalla, Foreign Ministry spokesman Ahmed Al-Sahhaf said that the ministry worked very diligently and through our embassies scattered throughout the world to explain Iraq’s efforts in the field of combating money laundering and terrorist financing, and to demonstrate the extent of its commitment to the applicable international standards that resulted in the lifting of the name of Iraq. From the list of the FATF.

He added that our embassy in Brussels had contacted the Department of External Action in the European Commission, and inquired about the criteria that the European Union would follow in including countries in the new list, noting that the embassy had sent two official notes to the European Union requesting that it provide it with the European standards that Iraq should apply.

The statement continued that the Iraqi embassy in Brussels conducted a number of meetings, and also held a number of meetings, and among these meetings he was with the Director General of the Department of Stability, Services and Financial Markets in the European Commission for the purpose of inquiring about the issue of including Iraq on the European Union list of high-risk countries in the field of laundering Money and terrorist financing, explaining that Iraq’s efforts in this field and its commitment to the standards of the international anti-money laundering agency were explained, whether at the level of legislation or implementation, adding that the competent Iraqi authorities have referred many perpetrators of financial crimes related to this context to the specialized courts.

 He indicated that the steps that the Foreign Ministry had to take in this direction was that Foreign Minister Fouad Hussein sent a letter to his counterparts, the Foreign Ministers of the European Union countries, calling for an objection to the proposed delegated list in the Council of the European Union.

The statement indicated that the meetings and meetings were also conducted via video conference technology and phone calls with European ministers and parliamentarians to support Iraq’s objection and remove it from this list.

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