India welcomes FATF decision to 'grey list' Pakistan over terror financing

India on Saturday welcomed Financial Action Task Force’s (FATF) decision to ‘grey list’ Pakistan for allowing terror financing and money laundering on its soil but raised concerns about lack of decisive action on designated terrorists like Hafiz Saeed, who continued to operate freely in the country.

“India welcomes the decision of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) to place Pakistan in its Compliance Document (Grey list) for ICRG monitoring,” the Ministry of External Affairs (MEA) said in a statement.

The MEA said that terror entities like 2008 Mumbai attack mastermind Hafiz Saeed's Jamaat-ud-Dawa and Lashkar-e-Taiba were allowed to operate with "freedom and impunity" in Pakistan which was against the watchdog's commitments.

"The freedom and impunity with which the designated terrorists like Hafiz Saeed and entities like Jamaat-ud-Dawa, Lashkar-e-Taiba, Jaish-e-Mohammad continue to operate in Pakistan is not in keeping with such commitments," the MEA said.

Earlier on Wednesday, anti-terror financing watchdog FATF in its plenary meeting in Paris officially placed Pakistan on its ‘grey list’ for failing to curb terror financing. Although Pakistan was diplomatically trying to avert the decision but failed to convince the FATF.

Pakistan was the ninth country to be placed on the FATF's 'grey list'. Apart from Pakistan, the other eight countries were Ethiopia, Serbia, Sri Lanka, Syria, Trinidad and Tobago, Tunisia and Yemen.

The FATF was established in 1989 to set standards and promote effective implementation of legal, regulatory and operational measures for combating money laundering, terrorist financing and combat other related threats to the international financial system.

It maintains a grey and blacklist that identifies countries supporting money laundering and terror financing. This was not the first time that Pakistan has been put on its 'grey list', the Islamic country was on the same list for three years from 2012 to 2015.