The Special Investigation Commission (SIC) of Lebanon’s Financial Intelligence Unit issued a statement commenting on the recent misinformed statements that Lebanon may be listed on the “Grey List” this week.

The SIC stated that “Lebanon’s Mutual Evaluation Report (MER) was discussed and adopted during the 36th Plenary and Working Group meetings of MENAFATF (Middle East and North Africa Financial Action Task Force), which ended yesterday in Bahrain.”

“The adoption of the report concludes a lengthy 16-month period that assessed, under difficult circumstances, Lebanon’s AML/CFT (Anti-Money Laundering and Counter Financing of Terrorism) regime based on the Financial Action Task Force’s assessment methodology that is applied across all jurisdictions,” according to the statement.

The document explained that “while the report will identify deficiencies that need to be addressed, it will also acknowledge the positive aspects of Lebanon’s AML/CFT regime. To this end, Lebanon will have to take corrective measures to address the identified deficiencies and submit a progress report to MENAFATF in 2024.”

The commission announced that “following due process, the adopted report will be published in June 2023, and we will issue an official statement in this regard.”