Earlier today the Government of Panama jointly with the Basel Institute on Governance announced the establishment of the country’s first High Level Reporting Mechanism (HLRM).
On 17 March 2016, the Basel Institute’s Head of Public Governance (Research) Division, Dr. Claudia Baez-Camargo, presented her paper ‘Where does informality stop and corruption begin?
Experts from ICAR delivered two back-to-back 5-day country specific training programmes in financial investigations and asset recovery in New Delhi, India, from 29 February to 11 March 2016. These workshops were conducted as part of a technical assistance arrangement between the UK Foreign & Commonwealth Office in India and the Indian Ministry of Finance Enforcement Directorate (MOF-ED).
On 22 and 23 February 2016, the Basel Institute’s International Centre for Asset Recovery (ICAR) conducted an awareness raising seminar for approximately 100 prosecutors, investigators and other members of the International Criminal Court (ICC), held at the seat of the Court in The Hague, on financial investigations and asset recovery.
On 9 March 2016, the Basel Institute on Governance, through its Managing Director Ms Gretta Fenner, and the Peruvian Judiciary, through its head of the Judiciary Victor Ticona Postigo, signed a framework agreement in a bid to fight cross-border corruption and money laundering and, in turn, facilitate the return of assets arising from such crimes.
The Basel Institute on Governance, RISE Project and the Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) are hosting a training workshop on Financial Investigations and Asset Recovery – “Follow the money”.
The Basel Institute’s International Centre for Asset Recovery (ICAR), in collaboration with the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime (UNODC), conducted a National Workshop on the management of seized/frozen and confiscated criminal assets in Accra, Ghana, from 24 to 26 February 2016.
The Basel Institute has been awarded two new research grants; one by the British Academy as part of its GBP 4 million global anti-corruption research scheme in partnership with the Department for International Development (DFID) in the context of DFID’s Anti-Corruption Evidence ('ACE') Research Programme; the second by DFID’s East Africa Research Fund (EARF).
On 15 January 2016 the Peruvian National Public Prosecutor and the State Secretariat for Economic Affairs of Switzerland (SECO) signed an agreement to prevent and investigate acts of corruption in public finance at the subnational level and recover misappropriated public assets.
This agreement is part of the ¨Subnational Public Finance Management Strengthening Program¨ signed between the governments of Peru and Switzerland in October 2015, which is being implemented by the Basel Institute on Governance through its Lima office.
Experts from the Basel Institute’s International Centre for Collective Action (ICCA) were in Kigali, Rwanda on 25-27 January to support the country’s Office of the Ombudsman in developing Collective Action strategies for public-private sector cooperation to tackle corruption.