CSO activities are increasingly restricted in the name of security and counter-terrorism. Such measures impose burdens on civil society operations by diverting resources to administrative tasks from activities that meet people needs, limiting individual and cross-border philanthropy and creating barriers for humanitarian aid or advocacy.
Dismantling a harmful narrative
In 2016, ECNL with a coalition of CSOs and as a result of intensive research and advocacy achieved a transformative change: the narrative, previously enshrined in the global standard of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) that all CSOs are particularly vulnerable to terrorist abuse, was dismantled. A significant justification for restrictive laws was removed, and now the new standard requires countries to identify if and which CSOs are at risk and to adopt proportionate measures only to those identified as being at risk.
Building an active community
To aid implementation of this new standard, ECNL and its partners have convened a global Expert Hub of initially 36 activists from 26 countries on AML/CFT, committed to lead initiatives in their own countries in this field. ECNL trains them on how to apply the standard, rebut attacks on their operations and how to engage with banks to avoid closure or suspension of CSO bank accounts.
Hub members now build their own coalitions, document the effects of AML/CFT measures in their own countries, develop strategies and reform laws. With our support, Hub members in Kyrgyzstan and Tunisia developed joint government -CSO risk assessments, a best practice which is attracting global interest. In Tunisia, this process transformed the relationship between the CSOs and the government, with the latter convening a working group to consider relevant legal issues.
Pushing back against misuse of counterterrorism laws – a case study from Serbia
In July 2020, the Ministry of Finance and the Administration launched an inspection and extraordinary information collection from commercial banks, based on the Prevention of Money Laundering Law. The law states that such inspection should be performed exclusively for organisations for which there are grounds for suspicion of their involvement in the financing of terrorism or money laundering. The investigation targeted numerous organizations and individuals dealing with investigative journalism, protection of human rights, transparency, development of democracy, rule of law and philanthropy. The overall conclusion was that this constituted a political abuse of institutions, a dangerous attempt to further collapse the rule of law in Serbia and put pressure on the media and CSOs.
ECNL launched a rapid response action and provided immediate support through strategic guidance, arguments and information to national organisations and individuals (See this press release.) Specifically, ECNL took the following steps:
- Increased understanding of the partners on the FATF and their requirements, so that they can assess the drivers of this restrictive move and consider counterarguments.
Our partners told us that we have helped them ‘navigate through the complex maze’ of counterterrorism financing rules.
- Provided expertise to national partners to develop a briefer with arguments and background information on the FATF. The briefer was disseminated to international relevant stakeholders in the country (embassies, donors, EU Delegation, etc.).
- Took part in organizing and speaking at several online discussions with interested CSO and media as well as embassy, donor and international representatives in Serbia. We explained the situation and legal framework, background and standards were explained to gain more clarity into the issue.
- Together with partners we translated educational materials on FATF requirements, measures, and procedures for the CSO sector and government officials into Serbian, for further educational and awareness activities.
- Facilitated international outreach to distribute the briefer and issue a call for different international bodies to take action, i.e., either to ask for clarifications from the government on the investigation or to reinforce messages on civil society protection. We reached out to the UN Special Rapporteur on Counter-terrorism and Human Rights, UN Special Rapporteur on Freedom of Associations and Assembly, Council of Europe Conference of INGOs, Council of Europe High Commissioner, the FATF Secretariat, the Moneyval Secretariat.
As a result of the international outreach:
- Both FATF and Moneyval responded they will investigate the issue with the Serbian government during their Spring 2021 plenary session. Further, the Moneyval Executive Secretary, upon ECNL initiative, took part in the dialogue with affected CSOs to understand concerns first-hand.
- The office of the UN Special Rapporteur on Countering Terrorism and Human Rights issued a public statement on the situation. The Rapporteur also published its full exchange of communication with the government on this inquiry. This resonated in the Serbian media and gave CSOs additional support in requesting concrete answers from the government about the potential abuse of official power.
- The FATF issued clear and strong statement against states misusing security and counter-terrorism legal framework as justification to restrict civic freedoms.
All these actions lead to the authorities back-tracking on the investigation and claiming it was merely a part of the regular assessment activities and not at all implicating any type of responsibility of those on the list as investigated for AML/CFT purposes.