PYONGYANG, Feb. 27 (Xinhua) -- The Democratic People's Republic of Korea (DPRK) on Tuesday rejected a recent public statement by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) which said Pyongyang has deficiencies in its anti-money laundering and combating the financing of terrorism (AML/CFT) regime.
The official Korean Central News Agency quoted a spokesman of the DPRK National Coordinating Committee for Anti-Money Laundering and Combating the Financing of Terrorism as saying that the FATF statement is a "habitual act of the United States committed by misusing the FATF."
Besides blaming Pyongyang for failing to curb money laundering and financing terrorism, the FATF said in the statement, adopted by its plenary meeting in Paris on Feb. 21-23, that all jurisdictions should terminate the DPRK's financing of proliferation of weapons of mass destruction (WMD).
"The 'public statement,' a direct reflection of the U.S. sophistry, is no less than a worthless document totally distorting the reality of the DPRK where a proper AML/CFT system is put in place and into normal operation," said the spokesman.
He said the DPRK and FATF have been cooperating well, but such cooperation has been disturbed by the United States, which misused the "international standard" to justify financial sanctions against the DPRK by charging the latter with money laundering and financing terrorism and proliferation of WMD.
He also called on the FATF to condemn the United States and put sanctions on it for "having the largest stockpiles of nuclear weapons in the world and pouring an astronomical amount of funds into their maintenance and modernization."
The FATF is an intergovernmental organization founded in 1989 on the initiative of the G7 to develop policies to combat money laundering.