Albania has made progress in strengthening its framework to tackle money laundering and terrorist financing, finds the first Enhanced Follow-up Report, published today by the Committee of Experts on the Evaluation of Anti-money Laundering Measures and the Financing of Terrorism (MONEYVAL).

MONEYVAL decided that Albania will remain in enhanced follow-up process and will continue to report back on further progress to strengthen its implementation of AML/CFT measures.

The progress Albania has made since the 2018 mutual evaluation report allows the Council of Europe’s anti-money laundering committee to re-rate the country on five recommendations, originally evaluated as “partially compliant” and another one that was rated as “largely compliant”.

Following the adoption of the mutual evaluation report, which assessed the effectiveness of Albania’s anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist financing (AML/CFT) measures and their compliance with the Recommendations by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF), Albania was placed in an enhanced follow-up process. 

In line with MONEYVAL’s rules of procedure, the country has reported back on the progress it has made to strengthen its AML/CFT framework. 

The follow-up report analyses Albania’s progress in addressing the technical compliance deficiencies identified in the mutual evaluation report. 

Reflecting this progress, MONEYVAL has re-rated Albania on Recommendations 6 (targeted financial sanctions related to terrorism and terrorist financing) and 19 (higher risk countries) as “compliant” and Recommendations 8 (non-profit organisations) and 35 (sanctions) as “largely compliant”. 

MONEYVAL has also examined the implementation of new requirements concerning FATF Recommendations which have changed since the mutual evaluation report was adopted (notably, Recommendations 2, 18 and 21). 

Recommendation 18 (internal controls and foreign branches and subsidiaries) is now rated as “largely compliant” and Recommendation 21 (tipping-off and confidentiality) is re-rated as “compliant”. The rating of Recommendation 2 (national cooperation and co-ordination, which was rated as “largely compliant”) remains unchanged.  

Albania is now “compliant” on five of the 40 FATF recommendations and “largely compliant” on 28 of them. It remains “partially compliant” on five and “non-compliant” on one of the 40 FATF Recommendations. 

Contact: Dušan Vojnović , tel. +33 3 90 21 56 99