At the 19th Council of Ministers Meeting of the the Eastern and Southern Africa Anti-Money Laundering Group (“ESAAMLG") held in September 2019, it was declared that Mauritius complies with most of the recommendations of the Financial Action Task Force (“FATF") following the technical re-ratings undertaken by the ESAAMLG earlier this year.

The updated findings and re-assessments have now been published in the 2nd Follow-Up Report (FUR) which can be accessed here.

It is noted that Mauritius has taken a major leap forward since 2018 and now complies with 39 of the 40 recommendations except for “Recommendation 8 – Non-profit organisations". It is understood that the relevant authorities are working on tackling the concerns raised by the ESAAMLG on this specific area.

It will be recalled that the Mutual Evaluation Report (“MER") of Mauritius which was approved by the Council of Ministers of the ESAAMLG in July 2018, set out how well Mauritius has implemented the technical requirements of the FATF Recommendations and how effective its AML/CFT system is. It also provided recommendations on how to address the weaknesses identified in the Mauritian AML/CFT framework. The FUR assesses the progress made to overcome the shortcomings highlighted in the MER as well as in the implementation of the new requirements of one of the FATF Recommendations which has been updated since the adoption of the MER.