Roadtown, Tortola - The Virgin Islands (UK) was represented at the Caribbean Financial Action Task Force (CFATF) Meeting in Trinidad and Tobago, which concluded on Friday.

The delegation for the week-long 29th Plenary Meeting comprised of Solicitor General, Mrs. Jo-Ann Williams-Roberts, Deputy Director (Investment Business) of the Financial Services Commission, Mr. Glenford Malone, Acting Deputy Director (Banking and Fiduciary Services) of the Financial Services Commission, Ms. Symone Martin, Chief Operating Officer, Financial Investigation Agency, Mr. Julien Johnson and  Investigations Officer, Financial Investigation Agency, Mr. Alcedo Fahie.

Both Mrs. Williams-Roberts and Ms. Martin are assessors for this meeting for Dominica and Grenada respectively.

At the plenary, Mutual Evaluation Reports were presented for Honduras, Venezuela, Dominica, St Kitts and Nevis, Nicaragua and Grenada. Eleven other member countries had follow-up reports to present on their progress from prior evaluations.  Each year the CFATF holds two plenary meetings with the second immediately followed by a ministerial meeting.  Each plenary is preceded by a one-day meeting of the members' Financial Investigation Units. 

Attorney General of the Virgin Islands (UK) Honourable Kathleen Quartey told the Department of Information and Public Relations, “it will be recalled that last year the Virgin Islands Mutual Evaluation Report was presented at the CFATF November plenary held in St Kitts and Nevis, but it is essential that across the board the Virgin Islands remain current with the standards and reports on all members of the CFATF.”

Honourable Quartey added, ”this regional body monitors and evaluates its members by a peer review process, for compliance with international criteria for anti money laundering initiatives and combating the financing of terrorism, particularly those set by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank.”

The CFATF is an organisation of thirty states of the Caribbean Basin, which have agreed to implement common counter measures originally aimed at addressing the problem of criminal money laundering. It was established as the result of meetings convened in Aruba in May 1990 and Jamaica in November 1992. In 2008, the CFATF was admitted to associate membership of the FATF.