The People’s Bank of China has announced that China has been approved as a formal member of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) on Money Laundering after the completion of FATF’s first assessment of the country’s systems for combating money laundering and terrorist financing.

China’s membership was approved in a plenary meeting held by the FATF at the OECD’s headquarters in Paris, France, on June 27-29, 2007. This brings the number of FATF members to 34. Korea and India are currently FATF observers and are working towards becoming FATF members.

“Although much work remains to be done in key areas, China has made remarkable progress in implementing measures against money laundering and terrorist financing. It has helpfully proposed a detailed programme of further work to address issues raised in the assessment.” said the FATF in a Chairman’s Summary of the meeting.