- China has been elected as the vice-president of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) at the plenary meeting in Paris.
- Financial Action Task Force (FATF) is a global body mandated to combat terror financing and money laundering.
- In its plenary meeting, the FATF placed Pakistan under “grey list” to monitoring in its International Cooperation Review Group until June 2018 for compliance of Anti-Money Laundering and Combating Finance of Terrorism regulations.
- However, China, Turkey and Saudi Arabia, leading the six-nation Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) that votes as one bloc, were against Pakistan being put in the grey list.
- As per FATF rules, three votes from the FATF's 37 members are needed for not putting a country in the grey list.
Financial Action Task Force (FATF)
- The Financial Action Task Force (FATF) is an inter-governmental body established in 1989 by the Ministers of its Member jurisdictions.
- FATF Secretariat is housed at the headquarters of the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) in Paris.
- Established during the G7 Summit in Paris (France), the organisation aims to establish international standards for combating money laundering and terrorist financing and seeks to combat the growing problem of money laundering.
- FATF's decision making body is the 'FATF Plenary’. The FATF plenary sessions are held in February, June and October every year.
- It consists of over 37 member countries including India.