Corruption is a criminal behavior. To contain the harm done to society by the corrupt, we rely on oversight and prosecution. We expect integrity from our leaders, and while the ability to stamp out corruption through prosecution is imperfect, it is demonstrable that few are immune from scrutiny. The headline grabbing investigations of figures like Tom DeLay, Charles Rangel, and Steven Ratner are only the most recent examples.
Our response to corruption abroad follows the same reasoning. To foreign leaders we counsel: remove the corrupt from positions of power and prosecute them for their crimes. Yet for every story of a prime minister vowing to crackdown on corruption, we have dozens of stories breaking new scandals. The persistence of corruption baffles us. Fundamentally, our approach to corruption as an individualized problem is failing where corruption is an issue much larger than any individual.
A new corruption scandal erupts almost every month in India. But even here, the secretly taped phone conversations of a powerful lobbyist have shocked most people.
The U.S. extended its crackdown on offshore tax evasion, charging former UBS AG banker Renzo Gadola with helping American clients hide assets from the Internal Revenue Service by shifting them to a smaller Swiss bank.
The government today expressed concern over the “unmistakable trend” of private players parking money in overseas tax havens and low tax jurisdictions.
This is no ordinary bank: The ATMs are in Latin. Priests use a private entrance. A life-size portrait of Pope Benedict XVI hangs on the wall.
This year’s International Anti-Corruption Day is marred by a U.S. Chamber of Commerce attempt to weaken the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA), our nation’s flagship anti-corruption legislation.
Opening an Anti-Corruption Day conference at the United Nations, Assistant Attorney General Lanny Breuer hailed U.S. efforts at fighting what he called a “scourge.”
ONE in four people paid a bribe during the past year, according to the latest Global Corruption Barometer, which is published annually by Transparency International.
EVER since Panama founded its offshore banking centre in the 1970s, its governments have vowed to resist international demands for information about assets held by foreign citizens in the country.
Corruption is again dominating the news in India. Long-standing issues, such as broad attempts to avoid taxes, have simmered back to the surface and been joined by new accusations against the wealthy, major companies, and the government.
Nine years after the United States vowed to shut down the money pipeline that finances terrorism, senior Obama administration officials say they believe that many millions of dollars are flowing largely unimpeded to extremist groups worldwide, and they have grown frustrated by frequent resistance from allies in the Middle East, according to secret diplomatic dispatches.
From hundreds of diplomatic cables, Afghanistan emerges as a looking-glass land where bribery, extortion and embezzlement are the norm and the honest official is a distinct outlier.
The yawning gap between the transparency rhetoric of companies and the reality of their actions ...
February 10, 2012
In his State of the Union address less than a month ago President Obama brought ...
February 10, 2012
When the G20 signed the Convention on Mutual Administrative Assistance in Tax Matters in November ...
February 9, 2012
About three years ago, the U.S. Internal Revenue Service (IRS) caught wind that Swiss bankers ...
February 8, 2012
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