Guyana was represented in the person of Attorney General Basil Williams when the Caribbean Financial Action Task Force [CFATF] Steering Group meeting was held in Miami, United States this week.
Williams holds the position of Deputy Chair of CFATF. He assumed the Chair at the November 2016 plenary.
Attorney General, Mr. Basil Williams.
In addition to Williams three other Attorney Generals from around the Caribbean Region – Turks and Caicos Islands, The Bahamas and Trinidad and Tobago – attended the meeting. It fact the attendance of the high level officials was described as an ongoing demonstration of the membership’s commitment at the highest political levels on the importance of the Fourth Round Mutual Evaluations which began in 2015.
The mandate of the CFATF is to monitor the compliance of its 26 members with the international standards to combat money laundering and the financing of terrorism through the Mutual Evaluation Programme.
At the meeting Williams called upon all CFATF Members to adopt a sense of the urgency in their preparations for the Fourth Round Mutual Evaluations Assessments, even if the jurisdiction is scheduled to be assessed two to three years in the future.
Williams joined in solidarity with the views of the current Chairperson Rhondalee Braithwaite-Knowles, Attorney General, of Turks and Caicos Islands in encouraging all CFATF member countries to take the opportunity to attend Financial Action Task Force (FATF) Plenary and Working Group meetings on a regular basis so as to get first-hand experience of the global standard setting and monitoring process as FATF member countries discuss and adopt their Mutual Evaluation Reports.
The CFATF Steering Group plays an important role in the direction of the CFATF in terms of good governance, transparency and fiscal responsibility.
The attendance of Williams demonstrates the commitment of the Guyana to these high principles which are critical to the international reputation of the CFATF.
Guyana was recognised as one of the countries which responded positively and in a timely fashion to the call from the CFATF Secretariat for submission of data on technical assistance and training needs so that the organisation could provide the required support in order to strengthen Guyana’s capacity to effectively combat transnational organised crime and confiscate illegal proceeds, through the training of financial investigators and analysts.