Turkey's Finance Minister Mehmet Simsek attends an interview on the fifth day of the annual meeting of the International Monetary Fund and the World Bank, following last month's deadly earthquake, in Marrakech, Morocco, October 13, 2023. REUTERS/Susana Vera
Turkey is drafting fresh laws regarding cryptocurrency assets with the aim of convincing an international organization focused on combating criminal activities to delist it from the roster of “grey-listed” nations that have not taken adequate measures to counter money laundering and the financing of terrorism.
The Financial Action Task Force (FATF) downgraded Turkey to a so-called grey list in 2021. Addressing a parliamentary commission late on Tuesday, Finance Minister Mehmet Simsek said a FATF report found Turkey fully compliant with all but one of the watchdog’s 40 standards.
“The only remaining issue within the scope of technical compliance is the work related to crypto assets,” Simsek said.
“We will submit a law proposal on crypto-assets to the parliament as soon as possible. After that, there will be no reason for Turkey to stay in that grey list, if there are no other political considerations.”
Simsek gave no further details of the planned legal changes.
The FATF, set up by the G7 group of advanced economies to protect the global financial system, had warned Turkey about “serious shortcomings” including the need to improve measures to freeze assets linked to terrorism and weapons of mass destruction proliferation in 2019.