Tehran ( IP) - The chief of staff at the presidential office, told reporters on the sidelines of a weekly government meeting that the FATF bills were not approved by the Expediency Council and complained about the delay in the approval of the bills.

Iran Press/Iran News: Mahmoud Vaezi said, "The claims about FATF bills are not technical and professional in nature, rather they seem to be politically-motivated."

He said in an interview with Iran Press that ratification of the FATF bills is not just a government issue, what is happening now is that failure to approve the FATF bills may lead to additional sanctions being slapped on our economy and the banking sector, which is detrimental to our economy, and any institution which opposes the ratification of FATF -- such as the Expediency Council -- must accept responsibility for its actions and be accountable. 

The official added: "Now, it is over a year the Palermo bill has been in the Expediency Council in a state of limbo, with no action taken, even when the bill was returned to the parliament and now they are wasting time on CFT. It should be clear to people why they are dragging their feet, (wasting time) while they have been approved by the parliament and government and failure to Join FATF, is not in the national interests of the country!"

The Financial Action Task Force (FATF) is an inter-governmental body established in 1989 by the Ministers of its Member jurisdictions.

The objectives of the FATF are to set standards and promote 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.

In October 2018, Iran's parliament approved four bills put forward by the government to meet standards set by the FATF. Only two of them have so far gone into effect and the fate of the two others, one on Iran’s accession to the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime and the other one a bill amending Iran’s Combating the Financing of Terrorism (CFT) law, is still in limbo.

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