On October 28th 2011 a meeting was organized by the Ministry of Justice in preparation for the Caribbean Financial Action Task Force (CFATF) evaluation of St. Maarten next year.
The CFATF is an organization of twenty-nine states of the Caribbean Basin , which have agreed to implement common countermeasures to address 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.
On May 19th 2011 the Minister of Justice signed an MOU with CFATF in Honduras enabling Sint Maarten to become part of the organization which has the obligation to combat money laundering and the financing of Terrorism.
Country Sint Maarten will be evaluated based on the standard 40 recommendations and the 9 special recommendations put in place by the task force to ensure that the country has the necessary legislation in place to combat money laundering and the financing of terrorism. These recommendations, which have particular significance to the region, include the recommendations the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) established by the Group of Seven at the 1989 Paris Summit.
In order for Sint Maarten to be thoroughly evaluated and comply, a committee is being established in order to prepare for the CFATF evaluation due March 2012. A temporary working group has already been functioning for over two months now, to get the evaluation process started. Members of the working group include SG Ligia Stella, Department head TEZVT Shervin Frederick, Legal Advisor in the Cabinet of the Minister of Justice Ann Gumbs, Policy Advisor in the Cabinet of Minister of Finance Dwayne President and MOT Representative IT Analyst Natalie Busby. In addition to the working group, persons who also
partook in the presentation at the Legislative Hall on Friday included from Curacao, representative of the Central Bank Roselle de Weever and representative on behalf of the Attorney General Prosecutor Guillano Schoop.
The presentation gave a history of the CFATF and elucidated why the evaluation was important for St. Maarten’s standing in the Caribbean and World as it regards to the countering of offences such as fraud, money laundering, terrorist financing, environmental crime and trafficking to name a few. Stakeholders who were present to take in this pertinent information included representatives of the Chamber of Commerce, Caribbean Insurance Brokers Association and other members of the business community.
The working group reiterated by the end of the info session that all stakeholders, both private and public, needed to work together harmoniously in order to comply with the recommendations and that companies in the various sectors regarding financial transactions such as banks, insurance companies, car dealers and jewelry stores would be contacted directly about the role they would have to play in the gathering of financial information for the evaluation taking place next year.
More information on compliance and the list of recommendations is available at http://www.cfatf-gafic.org