A fresh agreement between the Office of the Prosecutor General (OPG) in Ukraine and the Basel Institute on Governance, signed in Kyiv on 2 February 2021, sets the stage for a continued fruitful cooperation on the country’s asset recovery efforts.
The agreement supports the efforts of the OPG to recover assets belonging to Ukraine that were illegally appropriated by former high-ranking officials and related individuals and legal entities.
The training team of the International Centre for Asset Recovery last week delivered an intensive Advanced Operational Analysis training programme to 20 anti-corruption practitioners in Ukraine. This was the first time our ICAR training team has delivered a virtual workshop that involved both complex group work and simultaneous interpreting, and we are pleased to say that it went flawlessly.
This study by the OECD focuses on the ingredients for a successful High-Level Reporting Mechanism (HLRM) to tackle bribery solicitation and other reports of unfair business practices in public tenders.
It covers the methodology and scope of HLRMs, explores its use cases and looks at case studies in Colombia, Argentina, Ukraine and Peru. It then covers 9 key ingredients to the successful implementation of a HLRM.
This brief overview of the High Level Reporting Mechanism explains what the HLRM is and how it is designed to address bribery solicitation, suspicious behaviour and other similar concerns in public tenders. It includes a list of benefits of the HLRM plus short case studies from Ukraine and Colombia.
Switzerland and Ukraine’s Office of the Prosecutor General (OPG) and National Anti-Corruption Bureau (NABU) have signed a tripartite Memorandum of Understanding on the occasion of the visit of the Swiss President to Kyiv.
Formally signed on 21 July, the MoU is the basis for the continued engagement of our International Centre for Asset Recovery (ICAR) with these two Ukrainian institutions in the fight against corruption.
Experts from the Basel Institute’s International Centre for Asset Recovery (ICAR) have conducted an intensive five-day training workshop in Kyiv, Ukraine for Ukrainian prosecutors, investigators and other anti-corruption practitioners. The participants learned to:
The Basel Institute worked closely with the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) to develop the Business Reporting Institution for the Ukraine, which represents a High Level Reporting Mechanism to address business corruption risks. An official agreement in respect of this new Institution was due to be signed in early November by the EBRD and the Government of Ukraine.
This process has currently been postponed by the Ukraine Government due to their need and request for further legal clarifications prior to the final signing of such agreement.
On 12 May 2014, the Government of Ukraine signed a Memorandum of Understanding (MoU) with the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD), the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) and several business associations, addressing bribery and promoting transparency and accountability.
Mandated by the EBRD to develop a mechanism to address unfair business practices and bribery for the purpose of improving the overall business climate in Ukraine, including prospects for foreign investment, the Basel Institute assisted in the set up of this MoU.
On 24 April, the Ukraine Anti-Corruption Action Centre, jointly with Ukrainska Prvada & GOPAC Ukraine, hosted an international conference to discuss and identify challenges relating to the recovery of assets stolen by former President Yanukovych and his associates, and thereby to initiate a (inter-) national dialogue to address these challenges. ICAR spoke on modalities for the return of stolen assets, alongside senior representatives from the Ukraine government and Canada, the European Union, Switzerland and the US, as well as specialist civil society organisations.
Mandated by the Office of the Prosecutor General of Ukraine to assist with tracing and recovering assets stolen by the former Ukraine President Viktor Yanukovych and his inner circle, and with funding from the local office of the Swiss Agency for Development Cooperation (SDC), ICAR conducted a five-day training workshop in financial investigation and asset recovery for the National Prosecution Academy of Ukraine in Kyiv from 19 to 23 January 2015.