Pakistan has rejected as fabricated news reports cited by Indian External Affairs Ministry claiming ‘continuation on the FATF's grey list’.

“No new decision was taken about it at the Wednesday virtual plenary of the global terror financing watchdog,” the Foreign Office said on Friday.

Citing local media reports on Thursday, Indian External Affairs Minister Spokesperson Anurag Srivastava claimed “Pakistan's ‘continuation on the FATF grey list vindicated India's position that the country had not taken any appropriate action against terror networks operating from its soil.”

The Pakistan Foreign Office said the Indian official was responding to the "fabricated news reports in the Indian media".

“Pakistan has been prepared to present its progress report to the FATF in the plenary meeting scheduled for June.  However, due to the ongoing COVID-19 pandemic, the task force decided in April a general pause for four months in the review process for a number of countries, including Pakistan, under the ICRG (International Cooperation Review Group) assessment.

“The decisions taken by the FATF in the February 2020 plenary meeting regarding a number of countries including Pakistan remain in effect and the evaluation of Pakistan's FATF Action Plan would be made in the next plenary cycle of FATF, in which Pakistan would present its progress report,” the FO said.

Reports in the Indian media are patently misleading and part of the incessant smear campaign by India against Pakistan, it said.

Pakistan repeatedly drew the attention of the international community towards India's sinister attempts to use the FATF process for its narrow political gains, the FO said.

"Pakistan has also been raising the issue of India's dubious credentials as an impartial and objective assessor of Pakistan's progress on the FATF Action Plan," it said.

India's efforts to ‘misuse the technical forum of FATF for discrediting Pakistan have been noticed by FATF members and are not appreciated by the international community, the FO said.

"We hope that the FATF membership would take cognisance of India's malicious campaign against Pakistan and reject any attempt at politicising the FATF proceedings," it said, adding that Pakistan was committed to completing its FATF Action Plan and making progress.

The Foreign Office also said that Pakistan completely rejects the MEA spokesperson's terrorism-related allegations against Pakistan.