Money laundering law to be modified: Mukherjee

Union finance minister Pranab Mukherjee said today that India was in the process of making suitable amendments to the Prevention of Money Laundering Act and Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act to align them with the main recommendations of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF).

The minister was addressing the Asia / Pacific Group (APG) on Money Laundering that started today in Kochi. The APG on Money Laundering,  an autonomous and collaborative international organisation has a membership of 40 countries and other international and regional observers.

The Prevention of Money Laundering Act 2002 covered 156 offences presently, under 28 different statutes as predicate offences while the Unlawful Activities (Prevention) Act dealt with terrorism and combating funding of terror, according to Mukherjee.

Meanwhile, a financial intelligence unit had already been established for reporting suspicious financial transactions within the country. As a member of the FATF, India had also accepted enhanced responsibility as the co-chair of the Asia Pacific Regional Review Group.

Mukherjee added that India had ratified the UN Convention Against Transnational Organised Crime and also the UN Convention Against Corruption, besides constituting a Financial Stability and Development Council, whose role was to have inter-regulatory coordination to ensure compliance with the nation's international obligations, he said.

Reiterating the government's resolve to counter money laundering and financing of terrorism, Mukherjee said that a number of measures to improve the anti-money laundering and combating the financing of terrorism (AML and CFT) regime were now in place, in tune with the FATF standards.