Joining FATF to Harm Iran’s National Interests: MP
TEHRAN (Basirat): A senior Iranian lawmaker warned against a parliamentary bill aimed at the country’s accession to the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), saying that it would harm the national interests.
"We believe that cooperation with the FATF will result in the self-imposition
of sanctions and will undermine the national interest of the country,”
Mohammad Ali Pourmokhtar, a member of the parliament’s Judicial and Legal
Affairs Commission told Tasnim.
The FATF and the related bills are a tool for obtaining financial information
from different countries, he said, adding that this information can be used as a
tool to put pressure on countries.
"When we give the country’s confidential information to some foreign
countries, naturally, the grounds would be provided for their infiltration into
the country,” the parliamentarian noted.
The remarks came as Iran’s Guardian Council Spokesperson Abbasali Kadkhodaei
announced on Saturday that the council members have rejected the proposed bill
that would allow Tehran to join the FATF.
The bill was deemed to infringe the Iranian Constitution because it should
have been initially proposed by the Judiciary, the spokesman added.
In June, the Iranian parliament passed a law that allows the country to join the
United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime (UNTOC), but
decided to put on hold debates on Iran’s accession to FATF for two months.
The MPs decided that dealing with the FATF issue be shelved until results of
negotiations with Europe on saving the 2015 Iran nuclear deal, known as the
Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action (JCPOA), become clear.
The Guardian Council is a constitutionally mandated 12-member council in Iran
that, among other things, is tasked with ensuring the compatibility of the
legislation passed by the parliament with the criteria of Islam and the
Constitution.
The Financial Action Task Force is an inter-governmental body established in
1989 with the purpose of setting standards and promoting effective
implementation of legal, regulatory and operational measures for combating money
laundering, terrorist financing and other related threats to the integrity of
the international financial system.
Source: Tasnim
