draining development.pdf - Khazar University

416 Draining Development?them, or nothing will ever change for the disadvantaged of this world.This chapter shows that the effective use of the law has the power tobring about change: it aims to share experiences that may help thosededicated to the pursuit of assets stolen from the people of too manynations by their corrupt leaders.IntroductionThe U.K. lord chancellor and minister for justice introduced the UnitedKingdom’s new foreign bribery strategy at Chatham House in January2010 with these words:By definition, it is hard to assess the costs of bribery. But the estimates wedo have are staggering. The World Bank estimated that around US$1 trillionis paid each year in bribes. Transparency International estimates that15% of companies in industrialised countries have to pay bribes to win orkeep business. In Asia it is estimated that 30% do so. . . .Politicians and officials in developing and transition states alone areestimated to receive between US$20 [billion] and US$40 billion in bribes;the equivalent of 20 to 40% of development assistance. And this is briberyalone. It does not include wider forms of corruption; embezzlement ofpublic funds; theft or misuse of public assets; distortions in public procurement.And it takes no account of fraud in the private sector.These are dreadful figures. And beyond these figures lie innumerableindividual tragedies. . . . 1Great steps forward to combat bribery and corruption have beentaken, particularly in the last 10 years, by a variety of international actors,including the United Nations, the Organisation for Economic Cooperationand Development (OECD), and the World Bank. 2 Guidelineshave been established; individual states have been urged to bring theirown legislation into order; and peer review mechanisms have been setup. These measures have had as their objective not only successful prosecutionof bribery offenses, but also, and at least as importantly, the preventionof bribery and corruption. Chapter V of the United NationsConvention against Corruption (UNCAC) and the Stolen Asset RecoveryInitiative have as their focus, however, the recovery of assets paid inbribes or embezzled by officials, generally high-ranking ones, politicians,and, most egregiously, heads of state.