Context: Recently, the decision by a Pakistani court in Sindh to acquit Ahmed Omar Sheikh Saeed of murdering journalist Daniel Pearl will be raised by India at the next meeting of the Financial Action Task Force, where Pakistan’s greylist status will come up for discussion.
Background

• In December 1999, Saeed was released along with Masood Azhar and another alleged terrorist Mushtaq Zargar by the Indian government in exchange for 155 hostages aboard the hijacked IC-814, famously known as "Kandahar Kand"

About FATF

• It is an inter-governmental body established in 1989 on the initiative of the G7.
• It is a “policy-making body” which works to generate the necessary political will to bring about national legislative and regulatory reforms in various areas.
• The FATF Secretariat is housed at the OECD headquarters in Paris.
• Initially it was established to examine and develop measures to combat money laundering.
• In October 2001, the FATF expanded its mandate to incorporate efforts to combat terrorist financing, in addition to money laundering.
• In April 2012, it added efforts to counter the financing of proliferation of weapons of mass destruction.
• Composition: The FATF currently comprises 37 member jurisdictions and 2 regional organisations, representing most major financial centres in all parts of the globe. It also has observers and associate members.
• 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.
• India became an Observer at FATF in 2006. Since then, it had been working towards full-fledged membership. On June 25, 2010 India was taken in as the 34th country member of FATF.

About Blacklist and Grey List
Black List: Countries known as Non-Cooperative Countries or Territories (NCCTs) are put in the blacklist. These countries support terror funding and money laundering activities. The FATF revises the blacklist regularly, adding or deleting entries.
Grey List: Countries that are considered safe haven for supporting terror funding and money laundering are put in the FATF grey list. This inclusion serves as a warning to the country that it may enter the blacklist.
Once a country is blacklisted, FATF calls on other countries to apply enhanced due diligence and counter measures, increasing the cost of doing business with the country and in some cases severing it altogether. As of now there are only two countries in the blacklist — Iran and North Korea — and seven on the grey list, including Pakistan, Sri Lanka, Syria and Yemen.
About Dark Grey list
According to FATF rules there is one essential stage between ‘Grey’ and ‘Black’ lists, referred to as ‘Dark Grey’.

• It means issuance of a strong warning, so that the country concerned gets one last chance to improve.
• It was the term used for warning upto 3rd Phase. Now it’s just called warning — that is the 4th phase.

The following challenges faced by a nation under consideration of Grey list are  

• Economic sanctions from IMF, World Bank, ADB.
• Problem in getting loans from IMF, World Bank, ADB and other countries.
• Reduction in international trade.
• International boycott.