December 11, 2001	Tuesday	Ramazan 25, 1422

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NEW YORK, Dec 10: The National Bank of Pakistan has clarified that it does not accept any cash for remittances to Pakistan as a self-imposed restriction.

Rafiq Bengali, general manager of the NBP on Wall Street, told Dawn on Monday that in the aftermath of Sept 11 terror attacks and subsequent guidelines issued by the US government “our legal and our compliance people identified that cash transactions are a high risk area, and since cash transactions are less than 10 per cent of our remittance volume, so we decided to limit the exposure of the bank” by not accepting cash for remittances.

However, “we accept cashiers cheques or certified cheques for such remittances,” Mr Bengali said. The NBP has pasted notices outside its branches informing its customers that it does not accept cash for remittances abroad.

Officials at other Pakistani banks said no direct instructions had been issued by the US Federal Reserve to stop cash transactions but strict guidelines had been issued under rules of the Foreign Assets Control Act to identify individuals or organizations making any cash remittances.

Mr Bengali said: “We have imposed such restrictions following the new guidelines from the US authorities which require detailed information about the persons sending money to Pakistan. The information we cannot readily provide if we accept cash from Pakistanis walking in to the branches.”

These instructions were issued following Sept 11 attacks on the US in a bid to stop any flow of money to the organizations which are on the US list of funding terror activities.

Mr Bengali said that “we have informed the Pakistan consulate and embassy about the changes.

“We are not a licensed commercial bank, we only have permission to remit money to Pakistan.”