Iranian Ministers Send ‘Warning Letter’ to Khamenei on FATF

Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei poses before delivering a speech marking Nowruz, Iranian new year, in this handout photo. Reuters
Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei poses before delivering a speech marking Nowruz, Iranian new year, in this handout photo. Reuters
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Iranian Ministers Send ‘Warning Letter’ to Khamenei on FATF

Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei poses before delivering a speech marking Nowruz, Iranian new year, in this handout photo. Reuters
Iran's Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei poses before delivering a speech marking Nowruz, Iranian new year, in this handout photo. Reuters

Several ministers in the government of President Hassan Rouhani have signed and sent a letter to Iran’s Supreme Leader Ali Khamenei requesting his help to finalize anti-corruption legislation related to the Financial Action Task Force (FATF).

The ministers demanded the urgent discussion of the government proposal by the Expediency Council, which has powers to approve Iranian bills.

In their letter, the ministers warned from the negative consequences of Iran’s delay in joining the “Convention Against Transnational Organized Crime” or Palermo and the “International Terrorist Financing Convention” known as CFT.

Media reports uncovered on Tuesday that the ministers could resign if the window for joining the international task force combating terror funding and financial corruption is closed down.

The FATF has given Iran a February deadline to complete the necessary reforms for its membership and to be removed from its blacklist.

The minister of labor and welfare, Mohammad Shariatmadari, confirmed on Tuesday that several ministers have written a letter to Khamenei requesting his help in speeding up the process of joining FATF.

The Expediency Discernment Council, which Iranian deputies hope will reassert its support for passing the CFT, is also almost entirely molded by Khamenei, who once every five years elects 44 of the body’s members.

Last Monday, the Iranian parliament failed in gaining the ultra-conservative Guardian Council’s approval for Iran joining the FATF, leaving the dispute to be settled by Tehran’s Expediency Council.

If Tehran fails to secure its FATF membership, it risks stringent and suffocating international measures striking the Iranian financial and banking sector.

The FATF is an international watchdog with objectives to set standards and promote effective implementation of legal, regulatory and operational measures for combating money laundering, terrorist financing and other related threats to the integrity of the international financial system.



Anxious and Divided, Americans Vote ‘For the Future of This Nation’

 Voters cast their ballots at the Park Slope Armory YCMA in New York on Election Day, Tuesday, Nov. 5, 2024. (AP)
Voters cast their ballots at the Park Slope Armory YCMA in New York on Election Day, Tuesday, Nov. 5, 2024. (AP)
TT

Anxious and Divided, Americans Vote ‘For the Future of This Nation’

 Voters cast their ballots at the Park Slope Armory YCMA in New York on Election Day, Tuesday, Nov. 5, 2024. (AP)
Voters cast their ballots at the Park Slope Armory YCMA in New York on Election Day, Tuesday, Nov. 5, 2024. (AP)

Waiting outside polling stations across the country, American voters were a vision of orderly calm and quiet nerves.

The solemn nature of the voting process provided a contrast to the hyper-charged campaign cycle, marked by two assassination attempts on Donald Trump.

"I was thinking about the future of this nation, and frankly the free world," Brockett Within, a 65-year-old New Yorker, told AFP as he cast his vote Tuesday at a polling station in the East Village.

In Georgia, one of seven swing states that will decide the outcome of the vote, 27-year-old beauty queen Ludwidg Louizaire said she was aware of the stakes for the nation.

"I think we all can agree that no matter what happens today, history will be made," said the winner of the Miss Georgia competition this year.

"The main issue for me is the continuation of our democracy," Ken Thompson, a 66-year-old mason told AFP, at Edison Elementary school in Erie, Pennsylvania.

- 'America first' -

Around the country, voters confided in AFP about the issues that had tipped their decisions, often echoing the main talking-points of the campaign from immigration, abortion rights to the economy.

"We don't need another four more years of high inflation, gas prices, lying," Darlene Taylor, 56, told AFP in Erie, a bellwether county in Pennsylvania which is the biggest and most prized of the swing states.

Wearing a homemade T-shirt bearing the names of Trump and his running mate J.D. Vance, she said her main issue was to "close the border" to migrants.

"America comes first, and (Kamala) Harris is not going to support that," added Taylor, who said she lived on disability benefits.

Liz Orlova, a 22-year-old in New York, said that abortion rights had been "at the forefront of my mind" as she voted in the East Village.

US Supreme Court justices appointed by Trump helped overturn the federal right to abortion in 2022 -- an issue Harris has pledged to tackle if elected.

"It's super messed up that across the country that particular right is being taken away from people," said Orlova.

- 'Way more people' -

Turn-out is expected to be crucial in Tuesday's vote. Democrats tend to do well among more educated and wealthier voters who cast ballots regularly, while Trump has courted more marginalized citizens who often opt out.

Both are hoping to turn out young voters in their support.

The lines outside polling stations along the east coast early suggested that many Americans had embraced calls from the candidates, celebrities and activists to carry out their duty.

"It's way, way, way more people here than the last" election, Marchelle Beason, 46, told AFP in Erie after putting on an "I voted" sticker.

Others confessed that they would simply be relieved when the blanket political adverts on television and the internet would end -- and a vote that has kept the country on edge all year will finally be decided.

"I'll be glad when it's over," Guy Mills, 62, told AFP in New York.