New Delhi (NVI): India and US have decided to further collaborate against the menace of money laundering, off-shore tax evasion and terror financing, and take their economic ties to the next level.
The announcement to this effect was made following the 7th meeting of the Economic and Financial Partnership (EFP) between the delegations of the two countries led by Indian Finance Minister Nirmala Sitharaman and U.S. Secretary of the Treasury Steven Mnuchin respectively here on November 1.
“India and the United States will continue to enhance our cooperation in tackling money laundering and combating the financing of terrorism (AML/CFT). Our relationship has strengthened over time as both sides have developed a holistic approach to our bilateral engagement on AML/CFT issues of shared concern,” said an Indo-US joint statement after the meeting.
“Our cooperation includes but is not limited to, information exchanges to combat global terrorist financing and to support the designation of specific terrorist facilitators and financiers, coordinating on AML/CFT and maintaining the integrity of the Financial Acton Task Force (FATF) global standards for AML/CFT,” the joint statement added.
According to the statement “Both sides had in-depth exchanges of views on a range of issues such as the global, US, and Indian economic outlooks, global debt sustainability, financial sector reforms, leveraging of capital flows and investment, and tackling money laundering and combating the financing of terrorism (AML/CFT).”
On enhancing the economic ties, the statement said that “both sides are committed to greater economic cooperation on global economic issues, both bilaterally and multilaterally in the G20 and other fora. India and the United States look forward to enhanced collaboration to address the challenges to global growth under the G20 Presidency of Saudi Arabia.”
Referring to their collaboration to tackle offshore tax evasion, the joint statement said “both sides took note of the progress made in sharing financial account information between the two countries under the Inter-Governmental Agreement pursuant to the Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA)…Both sides will continue to collaborate and share experiences for tackling offshore tax evasion.”
The Statement said that the US and India recognize the importance of foreign portfolio investors for supporting economic growth and underscored the importance of India taking steps to improve its investment climate for all types of investors for mutual benefit.
