On Thursday 12 November 2015 Basel Institute on Governance Managing Director Gretta Fenner met with Ukraine Prosecutor General Viktor Shokin to take stock of the cooperation between the Prosecutor General’s Office (PGO) and the Basel Institute’s International Centre for Asset Recovery (ICAR) to recover assets stolen by former Ukraine President Viktor Yanukovych and his close allies. Both parties recognised the challenges of asset recovery, and the particular challenges of asset recovery in the Ukrainian context.

On 26 and 27 October 2015, the Basel Institute’s International Centre for Asset Recovery (ICAR) supported the International Criminal Court (ICC) in a workshop, held at the seat of the Court in The Hague, on international cooperation and financial investigations. The workshop was supported by the Permanent Mission of the Principality of Liechtenstein to the United Nations and the European Commission and attended by experts from 13 countries and 6 international organisations.

Phyllis Atkinson, Head of Training at the International Centre for Asset Recovery gave a presentation entitled “Global Challenges in Following the Money” on 9 October 2015 at an event hosted by the Institute for Commercial Forensic Practitioners (ICFP) in Johannesburg, South Africa.

At the request of the National Anti-Corruption Commission (NACC) of Thailand, the Basel Institute carried out a three-day executive workshop on the role of good governance and anti-corruption in the context of national development for senior executives from various relevant public offices and related institutions of Thailand.

A partnership and cost-sharing agreement was concluded in May 2015 between the ICAR, and the OSCE Project Co-ordinator in Uzbekistan (PCUz) and the Swiss Co-operation Office under the Swiss Embassy in the country with regard to the PCUz’s project entitled "Support to combating and preventing corruption in Uzbekistan". Experts from the ICAR delivered a training workshop in Uzbekistan during September 2015 after first conducting an initial on-site scoping mission to engage with relevant authorities and to collect facts and figures for developing a relevant training programme.

Within the context of the three-year initiative on "Mapping and Visualising Cross-Border Crime” funded by the Swiss-Romanian Co-operation Program which was launched in 2014, experts from the ICAR conducted the second training workshop in Bucharest during 30 September – 1 October 2015. The workshop was once again conducted in partnership with two Romanian non-profit organisations, the Journalism Development Network (JDN) and the Rise Project.

From 14 to 18 September 2015, the International Centre for Asset Recovery (ICAR) of the Basel Institute participated in the 13th Interpol Global Programme on Anti-Corruption, Financial Crimes and Asset Recovery in Dakar, Senegal, coordinated by Interpol's Anti-Corruption and Financial Crimes Unit in partnership with the US Department of Justice Criminal Division and the Anti-Corruption of Senegal (OFNAC). The five-day workshop brought together some 34 participants from Benin, Burkina Faso, Cameroon, Côte d’Ivoire, Guinea, Nigeria, Senegal and Togo.

Having been engaged in Peru for a number of years on a series of anti-corruption projects, in particular in relation to the recovery of stolen assets, the Basel Institute is now expanding its programme of work in the country to more comprehensively support Peru in its efforts to devise and implement effective public governance measures for countering and preventing corruption.

Most of the top 10 highest risk countries in money laundering/terrorist financing remain
unchanged for the fourth year in a row, according to the 2015 Basel AML Index.

The Basel Institute on Governance releases today the 2015 Basel Anti-Money Laundering (AML) Index, which is an annual ranking assessing 152 countries regarding money laundering/terrorism financing risks. This is the fourth annual release of the Basel AML Index and it continues to be the only research-based rating of country money laundering/terrorist financing risk by an independent non-profit institution.

In early August the Basel Institute participated in the 12th Global Programme on Anti-Corruption, Financial Crimes and Asset Recovery in Botswana, which was coordinated by Interpol's Anti-Corruption and Financial Crimes Unit in partnership with the African Development Bank and the Commonwealth Anti-Corruption Centre.