Technical assistance from the Basel Institute on Governance in a landmark case of non-conviction based confiscation in Peru has enabled the successful confiscation of around one million dollars linked to terrorist financing.

We are delighted about the signing of a trilateral agreement on the return of illicitly acquired assets to Peru.

A Swiss-funded programme to strengthen public finance management at the local and regional levels in Peru has entered its second phase, with a virtual launch event gathering high-level diplomats and subnational government leaders.

I recently participated in a panel on the role of non-state actors in the recovery of stolen assets and proceeds of corruption at the 2020 International Anti-Corruption Conference, at which I presented the so-called “Russian arms dealer case”. The case is relatively small in monetary terms – around USD 700,000 plus interest – but hugely significant in terms of asset recovery efforts and international co-operation.

Peru’s Attorney General’s Office has recorded another successful use of its non-conviction based confiscation law, extinción de dominio, to recover stolen assets from abroad.

The case involves around USD 8.5 million plus interest frozen in a bank account in Switzerland since 2004. The assets derived from contracts for the purchase of overvalued MiG-29 and Sukhoi Su-25 aircraft during the government of Alberto Fujimori.

How do you carry out training for 5,000+ public officials across Peru during a pandemic? Our local Public Finance Management team explained how they achieved this at the country’s recent National Innovation Week. The answer: social media and asynchronous communication.

Thanks in part to the unconventional use of social networking tools like Facebook and WhatsApp for distance learning, the training initiative is now snowballing. Joint workshops have been taking place with government ministries and civil society organisations across all regions.

Estamos encantados de haber firmado un Convenio de Cooperación Interinstitucional con la Procuraduría General del Estado del Perú. A continuación figura el discurso pronunciado por Gretta Fenner, Directora General del Basel Institute on Governance, en la ocasión de la ceremonia de suscripción del Convenio de Cooperación Interinstitucional el 29 de julio del 2020: