Mauritius Moves to Strengthen Money Laundering Prevention Measures

The Financial Action Task Force (FATF) has recently assessed Mauritius’ progress in implementing measures to prevent money laundering and terrorist financing, revealing significant improvements in the island nation’s framework for combating financial crimes.

Key Findings

Assessing Risk and Applying a Risk-Based Approach: Compliant

Mauritius’ risk assessment framework is effective, enabling the country to identify and mitigate potential risks in its financial system.

National Cooperation and Coordination: Partially Compliant

While Mauritius has made significant progress in strengthening national cooperation and coordination, there are still areas where improvement is needed.

Money Laundering Offence: Largely Compliant

The country’s money laundering offence provisions are largely in line with international standards, enabling the effective prosecution of such crimes.

Confiscation and Provisional Measures: Largely Compliant

Mauritius’ confiscation and provisional measures are considered robust, allowing for the timely freezing of assets and seizure of proceeds from criminal activities.

Terrorist Financing Offence: Partially Compliant

While Mauritius has made significant progress in combating terrorist financing, there are still areas where improvement is needed to ensure the effective prosecution of such crimes.

Mauritius needs to strengthen its targeted financial sanctions related to terrorism and terrorist financing to ensure that it can effectively target and disrupt terrorist financing networks.

Other Key Areas

Correspondent banking
Money or value transfer services
New technologies
Wire transfers
Reliance on third parties
Internal controls
Foreign branches and subsidiaries
Higher-risk countries
Reporting of suspicious transactions
Tipping-off and confidentiality
DNFBPs’ customer due diligence
DNFBPs’ other measures
Transparency and beneficial ownership of legal persons
Regulation and supervision of financial institutions
Powers of supervisors
Regulation and supervision of DNFBPs
Financial intelligence units
Responsibilities of law enforcement and investigative authorities
Powers of law enforcement and investigative authorities
Cash couriers
Statistics
Guidance and feedback
Sanctions
International instruments
Mutual legal assistance
Extradition
Other forms of international cooperation

Conclusion

The FATF assessment highlights Mauritius’ commitment to strengthening its anti-money laundering and combating the financing of terrorism (AML/CFT) regime. The country’s efforts demonstrate a significant improvement in implementing measures to prevent financial crimes, ensuring the integrity of its financial system and protecting the global economy from illicit activities.