GABORONE, Feb. 6 (Xinhua) -- Botswana is in the process of establishing a center for combating illicit financial flows at the University of Botswana (UB), a senior official said Monday.
According to Peggy Serame, minister of Finance and Economic Development who presented the proposed 2024/2025 budget, the center will assist Botswana's compliance with the Anti-Money Laundering/Counter Financing of Terrorism and Proliferation (AML/CFT/PF) International Standards.
Serame said the center will provide requisite training to all stakeholders and instrumental for building capacity in preparation for the next mutual evaluation expected in January 2027, which is a peer review used to assess countries' level of compliance to the anti-money laundering standard by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), an intergovernmental organization tasked with developing standards to prevent and combat money laundering and terrorist financing.
According to FATF rules, member countries must identify, assess and comprehend the risks of money laundering and terrorism financing that they face.
Meanwhile, to ensure compliance with AML/CFT International Standards, Botswana conducted the National Risk Assessment which was completed in December 2023. Serame said the purpose of the assessment was to understand, identify and mitigate risks associated with money laundering and terrorism financing.
"The assessment revealed that Botswana needs to strengthen its strategies in order to reduce both the money laundering risks and the terrorist financing risks, which were rated medium-high and medium, respectively," said Serame, adding that an action plan is being developed with implementation scheduled during the 2024/2025 financial year.
Serame highlighted that Botswana's efforts come on the heels of removal from the list of countries with strategic AML/CFT/PF deficiencies, that is, greylisting.
"To avoid another greylisting, Botswana remains steadfast in curbing financial crime including money laundering and financing terrorism and proliferation," said Serame.
In October 2018, Botswana was grey-listed by the FATF for shortcomings in its financial regulation. Botswana was removed from the FATF's grey list after improvements to money laundering regulations were made in October 2021. ■
