The parliament will support any measures aimed at combating money laundering, said Ahmad Anaraki, a member of the Majlis Economic Affairs Commission on Saturday.
“Iran has always strived to play an active role in combating money laundering and we have developed stringent banking regulations for this purpose,” he told the parliament’s news website.
Anaraki called on international business leaders and major lending institutions to take note of Tehran’s progress in and commitment to developing AML laws.
He added that the Parliament would review Iran’s talks with the Financial Action Task Force (FATF).
Last week, the FATF announced it welcomed Iran’s adoption of, and high-level political commitment to an action plan to address its strategic (anti-money laundering and anti-terror financing) deficiencies.
The FATF has now suspended its counter-measures against Iran for 12 months in order to monitor Iran’s progress in implementing the action plan.
“If Iran fails to improve its record as promised, the FATF call for vigorous counter-measures will be reinstated. If there is improvement, the task force will consider further positive steps,” the anti-money laundering body said in a statement.
Iran took a meaningful stride toward upgrading its banking and financial laws and bringing it closer to international norms with the Guardians Council ratifying a long-pending bill in March to counter money laundering and financing of terrorism.
Ali Akbar Karimi, a lawmaker, elaborated on the AML measures in Iran which includes controlling money transactions (in rials). Moreover, companies are obliged to provide details about AML practices in their financial statements.”
“Iran has taken serious measures against money laundering; however, it seems that the FATF refrained from removing Iran’s name from the blacklist due to the political pressure imposed by some countries,” he said, without naming any country.
The lawmaker called on the central bank’s international department, the ministries of economy and foreign affairs to follow up the case with FATF until Iran’s name is permanently removed from its blacklist.
