Aug. 25, 2019: APG acknowledged Taiwan’s MER and recognized Taiwan as the best in the Asia Pacific area.

The Anti-Money Laundering Office said that the Asia-Pacific Group on Money Laundering, APG, announced Taiwan’s MER had achieved the standard of regular follow-up on June 28 this year. In the 22^nd annual meeting in Canberra this year, through the explanation of the Anti-Money Laundering Office and officials from other Taiwan departments, 41 member states from Asia-Pacific agreed to acknowledge Taiwan’s MER.

The Office also expressed that Taiwan has achieved seven substantial standards on the immediate outcome (including Risk, Policy and Coordination, International Cooperation, Financial intelligence ML/TF, Confiscation, TF investigation and prosecution, TF preventive measures and financial sanctions, PF financial sanctions), and 36 Largely compliant standard on Technical compliant. There are three items in the part of technical compliant that were supported by the majority of membership, so our level was upgraded to regular follow-up by APG. This kind of achievement is scarce and is the best in Asia-Pacific. The result still needs the legal procedure conduct by APG to make the final confirmation.

The Office said that our delegation which the Anti-Money Laundering Office led consisted of many officials from different departments. Among 41 member states of APG, only Macau, Indonesia, Hong Kong, and Cook Island met the same standard of “regular follow-up” as Taiwan. The efforts of our government in recent years to promote the prevention of money laundering have won international recognition.

The Office indicated that Taiwan committed to fight against crime and prevent money laundering following international requirements of anti-money laundering. Taiwan formally established “The Anti-Money Laundering Office” on March 16, 2017, in line with the third round of mutual evaluation and amended hundreds of laws and regulations, including the Money Laundering Control Act. With the cooperation of public and private industries and the full support of people, after nearly three years of preparation and a one-year evaluation period, a total of 37 government department units and 31 enterprises have invested, which can show the achievements of Taiwan’s public and private cooperation. Given that the prevention of money laundering is an ongoing task, we will continue to work hard and become an essential partner in preventing international money laundering.