FATF: Terrorist Activities Funded by India

By Sajjad Shaukat

Financial Action Task Force (FATF) was formed in 1989 by the G7 Summit in Paris to combat the growing problem of money laundering, monitoring legislative, financial and law enforcement activities taken at the national and international level, reporting on compliance, and issuing recommendations. The organisation’s mandate was expanded to include terrorist financing following the September 11 terror attacks in the US in 2001. 

However, in a major development, the FATF on October 21, 2023 took Pakistan off the global money laundering watch list. Country’s officials said that Islamabad hoped that the move would ease foreign investment and boost the country’s economy.

In a statement, the Paris-based organisation welcomed Pakistan’s significant progress in Anti-Money laundering (AML) and Counter-Terrorist Financing (CFT) regime. It elaborated that Islamabad “has strengthened the effectiveness of its AML/CFT regime and addressed technical deficiencies to meet the commitments of its action plans regarding strategic deficiencies that the FATF identified in June 2018 and June 2021, the latter of which was completed in advance of the deadlines, encompassing 34 action items in total. Pakistan is therefore no longer subject to the FATF’s increased monitoring process”.

Separately, the FATF president told in a news conference that Pakistan required no further work to do.

The then Minister of State Hina Rabbani Khar had told reporters via video link from Paris, where she attended the FATF plenary, the decision to remove from the FATF grey list was unanimous.

It is mentionable Islamabad rubbished New Delhi’s ‘malicious campaign’ ahead of the FATF meeting. In this regard, Foreign Office (FO) spokesperson Asim Iftikhar explained: “This was not the first time the Indian media has been fed official leaks to promote misleading, baseless and fabricated propaganda against Pakistan, just before the official FATF meetings”.

The spokesperson added that the FATF and the wider international community have repeatedly acknowledged the steps taken by Pakistan to improve its anti-money laundering and counter-financing of terrorism regime.

It is noteworthy that in 2021, the then PTI-led government got three laws—the Anti-Money Laundering (second amendment) Bill-2020, Anti-Terrorism Act (ATA) (third amendment) Bill-2020, and Islamabad Capital Territory Waqf Properties Bill-2020, which were passed in the joint sitting of Parliament.

Meanwhile, law enforcement agencies had cracked down on many hardliner-religious groups particularly Lashkar-e-Taiba (LeT) and its welfare arms, Jamaatud Dawa (JuD) and Falah-e-Insanyat—and on their sources of income, arresting, trying, and convicting several of their members and leaders.

The country has been on the FATF grey list since June 2018, while some Western countries and especially India have been calling on Islamabad to take action against the terror groups to avoid ‘Dark Gray’ list status of the watchdog. They have long failed to do. Indian media had spread disinformation that Pakistan may be put on ‘Dark Grey’ list.

For years, New Delhi has been, also accusing Pakistan of using the banking system to sponsor terrorism.

On the other side, involvement of Indian banks in money laundering and financing terrorism has been exposed. In this context, on September 27, 2020, a report of the top-secret files of the US Treasury Department’s Financial Crimes Enforcement Network (FinCEN) which works to combat money laundering, terrorism financing and financial fraud revealed the “involvement of Indian banks, including the state-owned banks in money laundering through transactions used in facilitating and financing acts of terrorism, particularly in the region…the entities and individuals were involved in money laundering of $1.53 billion through 3,201 illegal and suspicious transactions between 2011 and 2017”.

There are also reports that gold and diamond were also used for money laundering, while Indian Premier League (cricket tournament) had also been pointed out by the Indian judiciary for money laundering practices.

Notably, India’s financial crime fighting agency-the Enforcement Directorate (ED) summoned Congress president Sonia Gandhi and her son Rahul Gandhi-the opposition leader on June 1, last year in relation to money laundering investigation. Afterwards, investigators questioned Rahul Gandhi in this respect.

It is worth-mentioning that the ex-Pakistan Parliamentary Committee on Kashmir Chairman

Shehryar Khan Afridi and former Prime Minister of Azad Jammu & Kashmir Sardar Attique Khan have expressed deep concern on August 26, 2020 over reports that Rashtriya Swayamsevak Sang (RSS), a Hindu terrorist outfit, has been receiving funding from Indian diaspora based in dozens of countries from across the globe.

In a meeting to discuss the developments taking place in Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu & Kashmir (IIOJK), both the leaders urged the United Nations, the FATF and other financial institutions to take cognizance of the situation and follow it up with immediate action to block these illegal transactions, as RSS has been using these funds to kill and torture religious minorities in mainland India as well Indian Illegally Occupied Jammu & Kashmir.

The two leaders said that the RSS terrorists have carried out terrorist attacks across India killing Muslims including in 2006 Malegaon blasts, Mecca Masjid bombing in Hyderabad, Samjhauta Express bombings and the Ajmer Sharif Dargah blasts.

In this connection, exposing the nexus between BJP and RSS, the then Indian Home Minister Sushil Kumar Shinde revealed on January 20, 2013 that organized training camps run by the fundamentalist parties, RSS and BJP were promoting Hindu Terrorism. He also elaborated that these extremist parties were behind the Samjhauta Express, Meccca Masjid and Malegaon blasts.

He added: “We will have to think about it (Saffron terrorism) seriously…Hindu extremist parties BJP and RSS were involved many times in Hindu Muslim violence in India, especially Gujarat and Babri masjid incident.”

The then India’s External Affairs Minister Salman Khurshid endorsed Shinde’s statement, stating that it was based on facts.

Nevertheless, Khan and Afridi pointed out that the RSS gave birth to India’s ruling party, the Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP).

They further stated: “The RSS is receiving funding from Indian diaspora based in various countries and Indian Consulates are facilitating the transfer of funding to the terrorist organizations that is killing and lynching Muslims in India and Kashmir and carrying a Hindu supremacist ideology,”, expressing “shock over the silence of FATF over illegal and illicit transactions to the RSS.”

Both the leaders emphasized, saying: “The global financial watchdog, Financial Action Task Force, must take measures to combat money-laundering and terror-financing to the Hindu terror outfits”.

Afridi reiterated that the people and leadership of Pakistan are “committed to the cause of Kashmir and would remain steadfast till the dispute is resolved according to the aspirations of the Kashmiri people”.

Khan remarked: “The Kashmir dispute is a very complex issue and Pakistan has to focus on narrative-building to put facts before the world”, and called on diaspora groups “to spread awareness in the West over the Kashmir dispute”.

Like other news agencies, Anadolu Agency (website) reported: “In August 2019, India imposed a lockdown on Jammu and Kashmir, a move widely decried by human rights groups as well as the global Islamic community. Jammu and Kashmir is held by India and Pakistan in parts and claimed by both in full. A small sliver of Kashmir is also held by China. Since they were partitioned in 1947, the two countries have fought three wars—in 1948, 1965 and 1971— including two over Kashmir. Some Kashmiri groups in Jammu and Kashmir have been fighting against Indian rule for independence or unification with neighboring Pakistan. According to several human rights groups, thousands of people have been killed in the conflict in the region since 1989”.

And in November, 2020 at a joint press conference and a joint press briefing, Pakistan’s military spokesperson the then DG of ISPR Major-General Babar Iftikhar and the former Foreign Minister Shah Mehmood Qureshi unveiled a dossier containing “irrefutable evidence” of India’s sponsorship of terrorism in Pakistan.

Pakistan’s Ambassador to the UN Munir Akram handed over the dossier to the UN Secretary General Antonio Guterres.

In its 27th report, dated February 3, 2021 and the 28th report, published in the recent past, the UN Security Council’s monitoring team for tracking terrorist groups confirmed Pakistan’s dossier. The reports focused on the global threat posed by Al-Qaeda, Daesh and their linked groups—drew attention to the increasing cross-border terrorist threat to Pakistan from Tehreek-e-Taliban Pakistan [TTP], operating from Afghan soil. In its new report on May 28, 2022, it once again highlighted the threat by the TTP which has conducted numerous deadly “cross-border” attacks and operations in Pakistan.

While, Pakistan’s Armed Forces displayed unbelievable progress through the various military operations—Zarb-e-Azb and Radd-ul-Fasaad which started against the militants in North Waziristan Agency and afterwards extended to former tribal areas, have almost achieved their objectives.

Especially, Army and country’s primary intelligence agency ISI have broken the backbone of the TTP and other banned terror-groups such as ISIS, Al-Qaeda, IS-K, BLA and their linked outfits which were supported by secret agencies such as Indian RAW, Israeli Mossad and even by American CIA to destabilize Pakistan, as the latter is the only nuclear country in the Islamic World. However, peace has been restored in various vulnerable regions of Pakistan, including Balochistan province. Now, there are rare cases of terror-assaults in the country. 

Nonetheless, FATF must take action against Indian terrorist activities and include its name in the grey list.

Sajjad Shaukat writes on international affairs and is author of the book: US vs Islamic Militants, Invisible Balance of Power: Dangerous Shift in International Relations

Email: [email protected]