The Tribune

By LEANDRA ROLLE

Tribune Staff Reporter

lrolle@tribunemedia.net

FOREIGN affairs officials are in discussions "at the highest levels" with the European Commission over its decision to blacklist the country last month, Attorney General Carl Bethel said yesterday.

These discussions, according to Mr Bethel, will continue until officials are able to meet face-to-face when travel has been permitted between the two countries.

Speaking in the Senate yesterday, Mr Bethel explained: "Coming now to the European blacklist, regretfully based on the Financial Action Task Force grey list, which, but for COVID-19, we think we would've been off of in April or early June, but we couldn't because of COVID-19.

"And so, the European Union placed us on our blacklist based on the fact that we are still on the FATF grey list. Dialogue at the highest levels is being conducted with the EU through the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Bahamas Mission in Brussels, Belgium and they're also developing contacts between the Office of the Attorney General and European Commission officials."

He continued: "And, we hope that as soon as travel permits that we and senior technical officers will have a familiarisation visit so that they would be able to go and meet face-to-face with their counterparts so that you have a face to go with a name or an email address.

"And we hope that this will happen as soon as travel to and from the European Union is permissible. Certainly, nothing can be done on our part until our borders are fully open in July as fully foreshadowed. "

The Bahamas was placed on the EU's blacklist in early May amid the COVID-19 pandemic.

Explaining its rationale for placing the country on its "high risk" listing, EU officials said COVID-19 enforced delay to the FATF's "site visit" to this nation meant it "cannot confirm" whether the country has resolved the deficiencies in its anti-financial crime regime.

"The Bahamas has taken steps towards improving its anti-money laundering/counter terror financing regime and, in February 2020, the FATF made the initial determination that The Bahamas has substantially completed its action plan and warrants an on-site assessment to verify that the implementation of The Bahamas' reforms has begun and is being sustained, and that the necessary political commitment remains in place to sustain implementation in the future," the European Commission said.

"The FATF has yet to carry out such assessment to confirm its initial determination. Therefore, the Commission does not have in its possession information which would enable it to confirm at this stage that the strategic deficiencies have been effectively addressed."

Speaking on the matter last month, Mr Bethel argued that the European Commission was using the FATF's initiative as a "precursor" to cloak its true motives and objectives towards The Bahamas and other targeted nations.

He also accused the Commission of hypocrisy given that its representatives on the FATF had also voted in favour of The Bahamas' site visit earlier this year.

"They must have been satisfied that we had made sufficient progress to warrant an on-site visit," the attorney general said at the time. "It's the European Commission that's represented at the FATF, not any other EU body or directorate. To now put us in the same category as Yemen or Myanmar, and countries of that ilk, which are only just entering the FATF process and have not made the changes The Bahamas has made, is disproportionate and unacceptable; totally unacceptable."