News
Documents published by FATF on 13 February 2026
24 Mar 2026
The Financial Action Task Force (“FATF”), the global standard-setting body for anti-money laundering and combating the financing of terrorism (“AML/CFT”), published the following documents on 13 February 2026:
(1) FATF Statement on High-Risk Jurisdictions subject to a Call for Action
(a) Democratic People’s Republic of Korea (“DPRK”) and Iran
- High-risk jurisdictions have significant strategic deficiencies in their regimes to counter money laundering, terrorist financing, and financing of proliferation of weapons of mass destruction (“proliferation financing”). For all countries identified as high-risk, the FATF calls on all members and urges all jurisdictions to apply enhanced due diligence, and, in the most serious cases, countries are called upon to apply counter-measures to protect the international financial system from the money laundering, terrorist financing, and proliferation financing risks emanating from the country. Since February 2020, Iran reported in January, August and December 2024, August and November 2025 with no material changes in the status of its action plan. Given heightened risks of proliferation financing, the FATF reiterates its call to apply counter-measures on DPRK and Iran.
DPRK
- The FATF calls on its members and urges all jurisdictions, which we hereby do, to advise you to limit business relationships and financial transactions with DPRK persons and apply enhanced due diligence to the DPRK and those acting on its behalf or facilitating transactions on its behalf.
Iran
- The FATF calls on its members and urges all jurisdictions to apply effective counter-measures, which we hereby do, and advise you to limit business relationships and financial transactions with Iran and persons in Iran and apply enhanced due diligence measures, including obtaining information on the reasons for intended transactions, business relationships and transactions with natural and legal persons from Iran; conducting enhanced monitoring of business relationships, by increasing the number and timing of controls applied, and selecting patterns of transactions that need further examination.
(b) Myanmar
- The FATF calls on its members and all jurisdictions to apply enhanced due diligence measures proportionate to the risk arising from Myanmar, which we hereby do, and advise you to apply enhanced due diligence measures to business relationships and transactions with Myanmar.
(2) Jurisdictions under Increased Monitoring
- As part of its ongoing review of compliance with the AML/CFT standards, FATF identified 22 jurisdictions (Algeria, Angola, Bolivia, Bulgaria, Cameroon, Cote d’Ivoire, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Haiti, Kenya, Kuwait, Lao PDR, Lebanon, Monaco, Namibia, Nepal, Papua New Guinea, South Sudan, Syria, Venezuela, Vietnam, Virgin Islands (UK) and Yemen) with strategic AML/CFT deficiencies.
- The FATF encourages members and all jurisdictions to consider the information presented in the 13 February 2026 issue of “Jurisdictions under Increased Monitoring” which sets out the high-level political commitment provided by each of the jurisdictions in question to address the identified deficiencies, including to (i) ensure the timely access to adequate, accurate and current basic and beneficial ownership information; (ii) implement an effective targeted financial sanctions regime related to terrorist financing and proliferation financing; (iii) establish procedures to identify and freeze terrorist assets; (iv) apply a risk-based approach for monitoring non-profit organisations to prevent abuse for terrorist financing purposes; and (v) improve customer due diligence and suspicious transaction reporting requirements, etc.
As licensed trust or company service providers are required to comply with relevant AML/CFT requirements, I would be grateful if you would duly take note of the concerns and observations made by the FATF in the above documents.