Suchergebnisse

"In recovering assets that are or that represent the proceeds, objects, or instrumentalities of grand corruption, do states violate the human rights of politically exposed persons, their relatives, or their associates? Radha Ivory asks whether cooperative efforts to confiscate illicit wealth are compatible with rights to property in public international law. She explores the tensions between the goals of controlling high-level, high-value corruption and ensuring equal enjoyment of civil and political rights"--

To date, "transnational criminal law" has been the dominant paradigm for explaining and mapping rules on corruption in the international legal literature. Transnational criminal law is presented as a system of law descending from multilateral crime control treaties or a field or order that emerges through international political processes of regime formation. Transnational criminal lawyers identify and describe cross-border legal rules, and seek to evaluate them against liberal norms of democratic governance and individual civil and political human rights. This Article details the limits of transnational criminal conceptions of "anticorruption" through a study of proposed changes to Australian laws on corporate foreign bribery. Drawing on primary and secondary documentary sources, domestic and international, it shows that the emerging antipodean rules are only partially transnational, as that term is understood in transnational criminal law theory. Likewise, multilateral "suppression conventions" and related soft laws are but one impetus for the proposed changes to Australian federal anticorruption legislation. Rather, as the transnational legal ordering literature suggests, a recursive process appears to be at work between international organizations and local legislators, as well as transnational non-state actors, both charities and businesses. This process is marked by moments of borrowing from (former) patrons, the US and the UK. However, it is also punctuated by themes of modernization, economic efficiency, and reputation. In addition, Australian anti-corruption activities may result not just in changes to national criminal law, but also in the development of "new" – and controversial – techniques of governance.

Are fair trial rights general principles of transnational criminal law (TCL)? If so, how do they protect individuals who are affected by transnational proceedings? Posing these questions in the context of international cooperation efforts aimed at 'asset recovery', this contribution asks whether State Parties to the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) are likely to violate the right to a fair trial in Article 6 ECHR when they directly enforce confiscation orders that are issued abroad with respect to the proceeds, objects or instrumentalities of high-value, high-level political corruption offences or substitute assets. The European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) considers that ECHR State Parties might exceptionally violate Article 6 ECHR in cooperative cases if the alleged victim 'has suffered or risks suffering a flagrant denial of a fair trial in the requesting country'. Surveying its case law, I argue that the 'flagrant denial of justice' standard greatly attenuates the right to a fair trial in cases of international cooperation in criminal matters. In practice, the Court appears unwilling to find violations of Article 6 ECHR in such cases when the foreign proceedings do not involve allegations of treatment contrary to Articles 2 or 3 ECHR. This, it is submitted, reflects the difficulty of assessing 'fairness' in globalised law enforcement situations, a factor that also complicates efforts to deduce a general principle of a right to a fair trial from 'justice' as an objective of TCL. If those principles are formulated inductively and comparatively, the ECtHR's case law nevertheless goes some way towards showing that a weak transnational fair trial right may be a general principle of TCL within the 'legal space' of the ECHR.

Are fair trial rights general principles of transnational criminal law (TCL)? If so, how do they protect individuals who are affected by transnational proceedings? Posing these questions in the context of international cooperation efforts aimed at 'asset recovery', this contribution asks whether State Parties to the European Convention on Human Rights (ECHR) are likely to violate the right to a fair trial in Article 6 ECHR when they directly enforce confiscation orders that are issued abroad with respect to the proceeds, objects or instrumentalities of high-value, high-level political corruption offences or substitute assets. The European Court of Human Rights (ECtHR) considers that ECHR State Parties might exceptionally violate Article 6 ECHR in cooperative cases if the alleged victim 'has suffered or risks suffering a flagrant denial of a fair trial in the requesting country'. Surveying its case law, I argue that the 'flagrant denial of justice' standard greatly attenuates the right to a fair trial in cases of international cooperation in criminal matters. In practice, the Court appears unwilling to find violations of Article 6 ECHR in such cases when the foreign proceedings do not involve allegations of treatment contrary to Articles 2 or 3 ECHR. This, it is submitted, reflects the difficulty of assessing 'fairness' in globalised law enforcement situations, a factor that also complicates efforts to deduce a general principle of a right to a fair trial from 'justice' as an objective of TCL. If those principles are formulated inductively and comparatively, the ECtHR's case law nevertheless goes some way towards showing that a weak transnational fair trial right may be a general principle of TCL within the 'legal space' of the ECHR.

AbstractInternational anticorruption treaties create an almost universal requirement that States sanction legal persons for the crime of foreign bribery. However, the vast majority of corporate foreign bribery cases are 'settled' between governments and firms. Analysing key anticorruption instruments and treaty body reports, it appears there is a dearth of express rules on settlements in international law but a qualified implicit endorsement of domestic settlement laws and practices. The international regime is investigated in terms of its move towards common standards for the use of settlements, and whether recommendations are consistent with stated objectives. The analysis discloses an irony: States and international organisations fail to clearly articulate their expectations on settlements, while calling for transparent, effective and predictable domestic settlement rules.

Terrorists need money to commit acts of violence and sustain their operations. Measures to combat terrorism therefore aim to prevent terrorists from raising, moving and using funds or other assets. The effectiveness - and the fairness - of these measures were considered at the second 'Giessbach' seminar on counter-terrorist financing (CTF) organised by the Basel Institute on Governance in October 2008. This book contains essays presented at the seminar written by practitioners and academics with extensive experience in the field of CTF. The authors offer a diversity of views on the domestic, r