If you’ve ever played “Whack-A-Mole” at the arcade, you’ll know just how frustrating and pesky those moles can be. Just as you think you’ve beaned one on the head, another one comes up somewhere else. Tim was told that a bigger hammer would do the trick. Standard disclaimers applied. If you’ve ever played “Whack-A-Mole” at the arcade, […]
The European Parliament on Tuesday overwhelmingly voted for rules aimed at protecting whistleblowers from reprisals following corporate scandals such as Dieselgate and Cambridge Analytica. With 591 votes in favour, 29 against and 33 abstentions, the parliament backed rules to boost the fight against fraud, corruption, corporate tax avoidance and damage to people’s health and the […]
A Mumbai-based investor who has stakes in a few startups and unlisted companies is seeking to exit the investments in the next few months. Another person, who had invested in a Kolkata-based company a few years ago and is on its board, is in an advanced stage of selling his shares. What triggered the action […]
And the number of countries where journalists can work safely is plummeting, its annual World Press Freedom Index revealed. Political leaders’ hostility towards the media “has incited increasingly frequent acts of violence that have fuelled an unprecedented level of fear and danger for journalists,” the report added. “If the political debate slides towards a civil […]
The new EU Whistleblower protection directive is a huge step forward, but journalists and activists still need to exercise caution in their work with whistleblowers. New principles for journalists offer a much needed guide. At the start of April, I was moderating a panel at the conference Dark Havens, organised in cooperation with Transparency International […]
Sözcü journalists on trial At a hearing for journalists from the opposition daily Sözcü, in Istanbul, on April 18, the prosecutor asked that seven staff members be found guilty for “willingly and knowingly helping a [terrorist] organization without being in its hierarchical structure,” the news website Diken reported. The prosecutors argued that Sözcü was aiding […]
Deutsche Bank reportedly fears fines, legal action and possible prosecution of directors for his role in a Russian money laundering affair. The Guardian reports this on the basis of an internal report on which the British newspaper was able to lay hands. Deutsche Bank, through its network, would have been involved for years in a […]
ISLAMABAD: Pakistan’s top court on Thursday accepted for hearing a plea filed by the country’s anti-graft body, National Accountability Bureau (NAB), challenging bail granted to former chief minister of Punjab and leader of the opposition in the National Assembly Shahbaz Sharif and former principal secretary to prime minister, Fawad Hasan Fawad, by Lahore High Court […]
Issued by Transparency International Secretariat Transparency International, together with its chapter in Montenegro, MANS, urges the Government of Montenegro to withdraw its amendments to the Law on Classified Information, which would undermine the country’s freedom of information laws and anti-corruption efforts. The government should organize a public hearing on the matter and harmonize the document with […]
In 2016, America elected a reality TV star as president. Three years later it appears that Ukraine is going to elect as its president a comedian—who previously played his nation’s president on TV. The prospect of Volodymyr Zelensky, an untested forty-one-year-old, taking over a government seemingly in perpetual crisis, including locked in a slightly hot […]
You’re a criminal with millions of dollars in ill-gotten gains but one big problem: Transferring slugs of money or carrying suitcases of cash will raise eyebrows. You need to “launder” the dough — make the dirty money appear to be the proceeds of legitimate enterprise. Then it can be spent anywhere in the world — […]
Shortly after the high-profile report of the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) dedicated to money laundering operations pulled off by Troika Dialog, once Russia’s largest private investment bank, and involving big European banks, the US authorities decided to audit their domestic financial organizations as well. The Congressmen suspect Bank of America, Morgan Stanley, […]
By Nicole Stolowy and Luc Paugam Whistleblowers face different realities depending on jurisdictions In February 2019, French judges ordered the bank UBS to pay a record-breaking €3.7 billion fine for soliciting and helping wealthy French clients escape taxes in France by moving their money to undeclared secret accounts in Switzerland. In 2007, Bradley Birkenfeld, an American citizen working for UBS […]
LONDON: Using cryptography and virtual drop boxes, Julian Assange’s WikiLeaks created a revolutionary new model for media to lure massive digitised leaks from whistleblowers, exposing everything from US military secrets to wealthy tax-dodgers’ illicit offshore accounts. Assange’s arrest in London on Thursday on a US extradition request to face charges of computer crimes could spell […]
The report author, Gibson Strategy chief executive Dr Stuart Gibson, said the wealth of new high-value residents (HVRs) coming to Jersey had substantially increased. ‘Those who have been coming in are coming, not with £10 or £20 million, but £100 million. I spoke to someone who came in with about £20 million and he felt […]