UAE placed on EU blacklist ?

[Bill D]

Hi,
I just saw this news that noone seem to have noticed, I am not sure it is legit because not backed by mainstream medias already :

UAE placed on EU blacklist in fresh blow to Kinahan drugs cartel​

UAE placed on EU blacklist in fresh blow to Kinahan drugs cartel
I got a few question, assumed that uae is placed on eu blacklist (assumed the news is true) :


1)does it mean that UAE resident would lose access to all the banks/brokers/crypto platforms licensed in the EU?(so most of them, binance, coinbase, ...)


2)For example bahamas is already on the list, people who are in bahamas, are you able to access all financials services and banks normally?

 

[wellington]

The Democratic Republic of the Congo, Gibraltar, Mozambique and Tanzania were also blacklisted.

Doesn't seem to hurt Gibraltar much, went to Tanzania a few years ago for business, had no issues with Euro account access... So unsure - what this entails.

 

[Au999]

The EU seems to enjoy blacklisting then de-blacklisting the UAE. Guess its something to do on rainy Tuesdays

 

[Konstanz]

where is the official source?

 

[Sols]

The article seems confused.

It happened in October 2022 and was done by FATF, not EU. Although Moneyval is a body of the Council of Europe, which is a FATF style regional body (FSRB), which follows FATF.

Documents - Financial Action Task Force (FATF)

www.fatf-gafi.org

The current EU list of non-cooperative jurisdictions for tax purposes does not contain UAE.

EU list of non-cooperative jurisdictions for tax purposes

The EU list of non-cooperative jurisdictions includes non-EU countries or territories that didn't make sufficient commitments to EU concerns on tax purposes.

www.consilium.europa.eu

1)does it mean that UAE resident would lose access to all the banks/brokers/crypto platforms licensed in the EU?(so most of them, binance, coinbase, ...)

No. UAE is not on the blacklist. It's on something more equivalent to a gray list.

2)For example bahamas is already on the list, people who are in bahamas, are you able to access all financials services and banks normally?

Bahamian residents and companies face enhanced due diligence (more thorough investigations), but are not barred from entry simply by being from Bahamas.

 

[Martin Everson]

UAE should sue those tabloids...lol. Such headlines are damaging if not proved true.

P.S I have found no trace of what they say unless they have been given leaked info before an official announcement by EU.

 

[Konstanz]

I think they talk about this EU list:

High risk third countries and the international context content of anti-money laundering and countering the financing of terrorism

The Commission is mandated to identify high-risk third countries having strategic deficiencies in their regime on anti-money laundering and countering the financing of terrorism.

finance.ec.europa.eu

However, I dont see it yet to be updated. Maybe article is misleading or it's leaked info.

Don't get confused with "EU list of non-cooperative jurisdictions for tax purposes" as Sols mentioned. It's different list.
Also there is FATF list. UAE is on FATF list but not yet on EU high risk AML list

 

[diatessaron]

Haven't read the article but if they're going to blacklist a whole country because of a drug cartel, they should've done so when cocaine started entering the largest ports of Europe, 40 years ago.

 

[Sols]

Haven't read the article but if they're going to blacklist a whole country because of a drug cartel, they should've done so when cocaine started entering the largest ports of Europe, 40 years ago.

The author of the article seems to be talking a FATF announcement from October 2022 and ham fisting it together with an Irish criminal gang. This looks like very little research was done.

UAE is currently not on any EU blacklist I can find. It's a stretch but if you view Moneyval as an extension of EU, then FATF's decision from October could be considered an EU blacklist.