Colombia and Anti-Money Laundering Regulations: The Influence of the Financial Action Task Force
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The Financial Action Task Force (FATF) guides international standards on money laundering and terrorist financing. Given Colombia’s past in money laundering, especially in the context of the country’s conflict between guerrilla groups, paramilitary groups and the state, this research paper seeks to answer the question “How has Colombia adopted FATF standards in its own war against money laundering?” This is done through an investigation of the mutual evaluations of Colombia conducted by the Latin American Financial Action Task Force (GAFILAT) along with a study of Colombia’s existing anti-money laundering regulations. After reviewing the recommendations that GAFILAT proposed to Colombia as a result of the mutual evaluations, this paper will analyze the implementation of those recommendations. The conclusions of this paper include a detailed explanation of how these anti-money laundering recommendations were implemented in Colombia and that the country’s intensified anti-money laundering regulations are the result of GAFILAT. However, it is unclear whether this implementation has necessarily had a positive impact on Colombia’s anti-money laundering war because there are inconsistencies in the number of recommendations met and the work is not analyzed along with any quantitative money data.
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