Countries fail to halt bribery

According to the 2008 Progress Report on Enforcement of the OECD Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials in International Business Transactions, released by Transparency International, enforcement was stepped up in only two member states over 2007, meaning that less than half of the signatory states are living up to their commitments. The report shows that there is significant enforcement by 16 governments but that there is little or no enforcement by 18 governments. It also includes case studies on investigations involving Alstom, AWB, BAE Systems, Halliburton, IMPSA and EME and Siemens. 'Unless all OECD countries enforce their legal obligations on foreign bribery now, there will be a decreasing incentive for those countries currently complying to continue doing so,' said TI chair Huguette Labelle. Full TI press release View report

Britain and Japan are among the worst enforcers of the anti-graft rules. The Anti-Bribery Convention by the Paris-based OECD aims to reduce corruption in developing nations carried out by companies based in the countries that have signed up to the convention. And, according to a report on the FIN24 site, the OECD has repeatedly called out countries for violations of the convention, notably Britain, which was reprimanded for scrapping a probe into an arms deal with Saudi Arabia in December 2006. TI also said Japan needed to 'send a strong signal that they are seriously pursuing prosecutions'. And it called on China, India, Russia and other major exporting states to join the convention. Full report on the FIN24 site

The termination of the BAE investigation compounded prior concerns about lack of UK commitment, including the failure to correct deficiencies in UK corruption legislation called for in OECD reviews, and the failure to bring any prosecutions, notwithstanding numerous UK investigations of foreign bribery said TI. The Guardian notes that the report also called on the government to abandon part of the Constitutional Renewal Bill, which would give the Attorney-General the power to intervene in investigations on the grounds of national security. TI said there would be 'inadequate safeguards to ensure this new power will be exercised responsibly and insufficient provision for scrutiny by parliament and the judiciary. The TI expert finds a lack of political will on the part of the government to prosecute foreign bribery.' The UK was also accused of being among 24 countries in which there was a lack of access to information about investigations. Full report in The Guardian

Russia is taking action to stem graft. The Kremlin's chief of staff, Sergei Naryshkin, has submitted a long-awaited plan to tackle the problem, which President Dmitry Medvedev has declared a top priority. Naryshkin told Medvedev in televised comments that the draft strategy consisted of four stages, starting with new anti-corruption legislation being submitted to the State Duma by 1 November, notes the St Petersburg Times. Measures then would be adopted to improve state management, followed by measures to enhance the effectiveness of professional training for lawyers. The proposed legislation would eliminate opportunities for officials to use their positions for personal profit and set strict standards for government employees. The Bill requires state officials and their families to declare their property and forbids former officials from working for companies they had previously been responsible for regulating. Full St Petersburg Times report

In India, the poor are the biggest victims of graft. Tens of millions of Indians living below the poverty line on 50 pence or less a day were forced to pay an estimated £110m in bribes over a three-month period for access to basic services. A survey, says The Daily Telegraph, found that the money was handed over by millions of the country's wretchedly poor for public services including the police, healthcare and education. Transparency International India said that its study between November 2007 and January 2008 found that the police force was the most corrupt public service. Full report in The Daily Telegraph TI Index

Corruption appears to be increasing in two-fifths of the world's nations, nurtured by persistent poverty, political instability and crime. Of the 180 countries looked at in Transparency International's most recent rankings, 132 had index scores below 5, including Greece, India, Mexico, Brazil, Saudi Arabia and Thailand. SA scored 5.1. Some 56 countries were rated below 3, a level that indicates rampant corruption, including Argentina, Pakistan and Russia, notes a Forbes report. Transparency International developed its index on a scale from 0 to 10, with the lowest number indicating the highest perception of corruption. The index is based on worldwide surveys of country specialists, business officials, human rights monitors and others. For the most recent index, the best-scoring countries were New Zealand, Denmark and Finland, sharing an index ranking of 9.4. At the bottom of the heap, where perceptions of corruption were highest, Somalia and Myanmar are tied with an index ranking of 1.4. The divide runs along economic realities. Forty percent of the countries rated below 3 are classified by the World Bank as low income. It doesn't help if the governments are weak or engaged in a struggle for power. There is hope, however. Several African countries showed marked improvement in their rankings over one year, including Seychelles (to 57 from 63), SA (to 43 from 51) and Swaziland (to 84 from 121). Full Forbes report TI survey