On January 23-25 in the Hague, in cooperation with HSC and ICNL, we conducted an intensive 3-day workshop on counter-terrorism financing (CFT) and anti-money laundering (AML) standards, procedures, and involvement for engaged CSO leaders and activists committed to lead initiatives in their own countries and regions.
The training contributed to the understanding of how AML/CFT rules and processes impact civic freedoms and how CSOs can engage to use FATF’s regime to protect those. Participants gained detailed knowledge of FATF AML/CFT standards and its country implementation, the FATF framework, issues, and stakeholders. The training explored the FATF processes, specifically the risk assessment and mutual evaluation on the country level.
The theoretical knowledge was always followed by practical country examples and learning from past processes. The global workshop was built on interactive sessions and opportunities to learn, share and discuss, as well as plan further steps on the national, regional and global level. All participants went home with their own drafted country-level engagement strategies they will use for national level activity and fundraising. In addition, with the support of the mentors, participants connected regionally and developed regional engagement steps.
All participants were the members of the Expert Hub on anti-money laundering and counter-terrorism financing, which is a newly convened resource group of local CSO leaders and activists committed to lead initiatives in their own countries and regions. The Expert Hub collects good practices, monitors and alerts on trends, contributes to peer learning, information-sharing and the development of guidance. Individual members will initiate and engage in local reforms, convene actors, share practices from global to the national level. The Hub links global, regional and national level work, its members come from 16 different countries and represent nearly all regions of the world.
Follow the Expert Hub on Twitter #ExpertHubAML_CFT. To gain more insights, read the detailed training report from Spaces for Change here.
The global workshop was organised under the project “Combatting Restrictions on Civic Freedoms arising from counter-terrorism & anti-money laundering rules” managed by the European Center for Not-for-Profit Law (ECNL) and implemented in partnership with the Human Security Collective (HSC) and the International Center for Not-for-Profit Law (ICNL). The project is possible thanks to the support of Oak Foundation.