Non-profit organisations under scanner
Recommendation to grant greater powers to financial monitoring authorities of non-profit and voluntary organisations was raised during a workshop held yesterday. Themed ‘Combating the Financing of Terrorism Countering Violent Extremism in the Charitable Sector’, it was held by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Central Bank of Bahrain, along with the GCC General-Secretariat and the US.
The financial monitoring authorities may soon be able to prosecute, dissolve board of trustees, impose financial sanctions or revoke the licences of non-profit organisations, in the event of non-compliance with regulations and applicable laws.
The recommendation is part of the efforts to curb financing of terrorism, in view of the burgeoning IS-led terror influence in the world.
Participants included Bahrain, UAE, Saudi Arabia, Oman, Kuwait, USA, Canada, UK, Italy, the Middle East and North Africa Financial Action Task Force (MENAFATF), World Bank, the United Nations, and the Countering Violent Extremism Community Policing (COVEXCOP) from Belgium.
The workshop featured exchange of views on the means of protecting civic organisations from the dangers of terrorism and the means of combating this phenomenon.
It reaffirmed recommendations on the need to conduct a realistic and detailed evaluation in the non- profit organisations sector and identifying the dangers related to the exploitation of these organisations in financing terrorism. The workshop also called to boost the implementation of procedures that impose appropriate penalties in the event of non- compliance with the regulations and laws.
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