The first edition of the Terrorist Financing Targeting Centre (TFTC) Fellowship Programme kicked off in Washington with the participation of a six-member national delegation of experts representing a number of ministries and government institutions and agencies involved in combating the financing of terrorism in the Kingdom of Bahrain, including the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, the Ministry of Interior, the Central Bank of Bahrain and the Supreme Judicial Council.
The Fellowship Programme is an international initiative that brings together representatives of the seven member states, namely the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries and the United States, and draws together experienced individuals who work on terrorist financing issues, particularly targeted financial sanctions, policies to combat terrorist financing, risk surveillance, national intelligence coordination, and financial investigation and analysis.
Chief of the Strategic Affairs Sector at the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and TFTC Executive Committee member, Ambassador Nancy Abdullah Jamal, stressed that the participation of the Kingdom of Bahrain in this Programme is an affirmation of the utmost importance that the Government of the Kingdom attaches to providing opportunities for continuous cooperation through the exchange of ideas and experiences among Member States on best practices in order to promote joint efforts and upgrade the levels of representation in forums to combat terrorism and its financing, which promotes the Kingdom’s commitment to acting upon the recommendations of the Financial Action Task Force (FATF).
The programme aims to activate partnerships among governments to improve performance integration by developing skills and enabling practices in dealing with and preventing the sources and outlets of terrorist financing, she said.
A number of US institutions are participating in the first edition of the programme, including the US Treasury Department, the Office of Terrorist Financing and Financial Crimes, the Office of Foreign Assets Control, the Financial Crimes Enforcement Network, the US Department of Justice, and others.
The Fellowship Programme serves as a link to build a regionally-based network of international enforcement that contribute to networking in order to protect the region and its surroundings from unlawful attacks and activities by terrorist groups and their financers to ensure the implementation of international best practices in the areas of tracing, targeting and implementation.
Source: Bahrain News Agency