Mauritius
is a founder member of the Eastern and Southern Africa Anti Money Laundering
Group (ESAAMLG) which assesses the level of compliance of its 18 members with
the FATF recommendations. Since 2013, this assessment considers compliance in
terms of technical compliance (the legislative framework) and the level of
effectiveness of a member’s AML/CFT measures.
Consequently
Mauritius underwent a second round of evaluation by ESAAMLG under the FATF’s
2013 methodology. ESAAMLG thus assessed Mauritius’ AML/CFT legal framework but
also its level of effectiveness. The Mutual Evaluation Report (MER)
of Mauritius was published on 21 September 2018.
The
MER highlighted several weaknesses in the Mauritian AML/CFT framework. To
address these, Mauritius made the commitment to urgently make several
amendments. In addition to several
changes brought to the Financial Intelligence and Anti Money Laundering Act
2002 (FIAMLA), new Regulations namely the Financial Intelligence and Anti Money
Laundering Regulations 2018, was promulgated effective as from 01 October 2018,
to address the FATF requirements regarding Customer Due Diligence, Politically
Exposed Persons, Correspondent Banking, Money or Value Transfer Services, New
Technologies, Wire Transfers, Reliance on Third Parties, and Internal Control,
Foreign Branches and Subsidiaries, amongst others.
Additionally,
in May 2019 Mauritius also passed new legislation, namely the United Sanctions
(Financial Prohibitions, Arms Embargo and Travel Ban) Act 2019 and made further
amendments to the FIAMLA to align its AML/CFT regulatory framework with the
FATF standards.
In
light of the above efforts, Mauritius has submitted two applications for
technical compliance re-rating to the ESAAMLG. These were considered at the
latter’s April 2019 and September 2019 meetings. Both applications have been
successful, and as at date, Mauritius has been re rated as Compliant or Largely
Compliant on 35 of the 40 FATF Recommendations. The first and second follow up
reports may be accessed here: April 2019, September 2019
In
December 2020, following its application for re rating on Recommendations 26
and 32, Mauritius was re rated in both cases to Largely Compliant.
The
consolidated technical compliance ratings may be summarized as follows:
|
Recommendation
|
Consolidated
rating
following the first and Second technical compliance Re-ratings
|
|
R.1
|
Assessing Risks and applying a Risk-Based Approach
|
C
|
|
R.2
|
National Cooperation and Coordination
|
C
|
|
R.3
|
Money laundering offence
|
C
|
|
R.4
|
Confiscation and provisional measures
|
C
|
|
R.5
|
Terrorist financing offence
|
C
|
|
R.6
|
Targeted financial sanctions related to terrorism and
terrorist financing
|
C
|
|
R.7
|
Targeted financial sanctions related to proliferation
|
C
|
|
R.8
|
Non-profit organisations
|
NC
|
|
R.9
|
Financial institution secrecy laws
|
C
|
|
R.10
|
Customer due diligence
|
C
|
|
R.11
|
Record-keeping
|
LC
|
|
R.12
|
Politically exposed persons
|
C
|
|
R.13
|
Correspondent banking
|
C
|
|
R.14
|
Money or value transfer services
|
C
|
|
R.15
|
New technologies
|
PC
|
|
R.16
|
Wire transfers
|
C
|
|
R.17
|
Reliance on third parties
|
C
|
|
R.18
|
Internal controls and foreign branches and subsidiaries
|
C
|
|
R.19
|
Higher-risk countries
|
C
|
|
R.20
|
Reporting of suspicious transaction
|
C
|
|
R.21
|
Tipping-off and confidentiality
|
C
|
|
R.22
|
DNFBPs: Customer due diligence
|
C
|
|
R.23
|
DNFBPs: Other measures
|
C
|
|
R.24
|
Transparency and beneficial ownership of legal persons
|
PC
|
|
R.25
|
Transparency and beneficial ownership of legal arrangements
|
LC
|
|
R.26
|
Regulation and supervision of financial institutions
|
LC
|
|
R.27
|
Powers of supervisors
|
C
|
|
R.28
|
Regulation and supervision of DNFBPs
|
LC
|
|
R.29
|
Financial intelligence units
|
C
|
|
R.30
|
Responsibilities of law enforcement and investigative
authorities
|
C
|
|
R.31
|
Powers of law enforcement and investigative authorities
|
C
|
|
R.32
|
Cash Couriers
|
LC
|
|
R.33
|
Statistics
|
PC
|
|
R.34
|
Guidance and feedback
|
LC
|
|
R.35
|
Sanctions
|
C
|
|
R.36
|
International instruments
|
LC
|
|
R.37
|
Mutual legal assistance
|
LC
|
|
R.38
|
Mutual legal assistance : freezing and confiscation
|
LC
|
|
R.39
|
Extradition
|
LC
|
|
R.40
|
Other forms of international cooperation
|
LC
|
Additionally,
to enhance the level of effectiveness of our AML/CFT regime, now a key
component of the FATF methodology, several sub committees have been established
to conduct focused work on each of the 11 FATF Immediate Outcomes.
The
11 sub committees are the following and are each composed of representatives of
relevant institutions.
|
IO.1
|
Risk, policy and coordination
|
|
IO.2
|
International cooperation
|
|
IO.3
|
Supervision
|
|
IO.4
|
Preventive measures
|
|
IO.5
|
Legal persons and arrangements
|
|
IO.6
|
Financial Intelligence
|
|
IO.7
|
ML investigation & prosecution
|
|
IO.8
|
Confiscation
|
|
IO.9
|
TF investigation & prosecution
|
|
IO.10
|
TF preventive measures & financial sanctions
|
|
IO.11
|
PF financial sanctions
|