The Middle East and North Africa Financial Action Task Force (MENAFATF)
Manama, Kingdom of Bahrain
May 22 - 23, 2024 AD
The 38th Plenary of the Middle East and North Africa Financial Action Task Force (MENAFATF), which was held in the city of Manama in the Kingdom of Bahrain, was concluded on Thursday May 23, 2024. The Plenary was chaired by His Excellency Mr. Hani Muhammad Wahab – President of the Middle East and North Africa Financial Action Task Force, Deputy Minister of Finance and Chairman of the National Committee for Combating Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing in the Republic of Yemen (Presidency Country). The meeting witnessed the presence of heads of delegations, experts on combating money laundering, terrorist financing and financing of proliferation from member states, in addition to experts from observer states and concerned international bodies.
During the Plenary, the reappoint MENAFATF Executive Secretary, Mr. Suliman Aljabrin, was approved for a second period for four years starting from the year 2025 AD. The Plenary also discussed and approved the mutual assessment report of the Republic of Iraq in the field of combating money laundering, terrorist financing and proliferation, and a number of enhanced follow-up reports for the Arab Republic of Egypt, the People’s Democratic Republic of Algeria, and the Kingdom of Morocco, which demonstrated the progress achieved in rerating the technical compliance levels in some areas of the 40 recommendations issued by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF). The Plenary reviewed the efforts made to combat money laundering, terrorist financing and the proliferation of weapons by a number of member states within the framework of the enhanced follow-up process including the Republic of Lebanon, the Kingdom of Bahrain, the State of the United Arab Emirates, the Hashemite Kingdom of Jordan and the State of Qatar.
The Plenary also discussed the areas of technical assistance and training, the latest patterns and methods of money laundering and terrorist financing, the most prominent risks, methods and trends of terrorist financing, especially through the exploitation of new technologies, the regional assessment of terrorist financing risks project, member states’ accession to the Egmont Group, and the proposal to establish an inter-agency network, for the Middle East and North Africa region for asset targeting and recovery “MENA ARIN”,
His Excellency the President of MENAFATF honored the member states and observers who contributed to hosting and organizing the training events for the year 2023, and thanked the generous attendance of the member states and observers for their presence and interaction in the Plenary and praised the efforts made by the Executive Secretary and the Secretariat in making the event a success. It is worth noting that the 39th Plenary of MENAFATF will be hosted by the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia in November 2024.