The Need for an Anti-Corruption Fund

The idea of establishing an International Anti-Corruption Court (IACC) has increased in appeal over the past few years. In 2022, the Netherlands, Canada, and Ecuador all signed a memorandum calling for the establishment of an IACC. Last year, the IACC Treaty Committee, composed of international judges, prosecutors and other experts in the field, began drafting a treaty to establish this kind of court.

While the IACC could act as a powerful deterrent against corruption, current proposals do not yet include ways to help deliver justice to those that are ultimately most affected by corruption – the residents of corrupt states. Even when perpetrators are convicted, funds lost to corruption are often never retrieved. Grand corruption harms a state’s residents through the loss of government assets intended for the development and preservation of public goods. This concerns the international community because these assets are all too often obtained through loans and grants from multilateral development banks such as the World Bank. An Anti-Corruption Fund therefore needs to be established in order to overcome the inefficiencies of asset recovery and mitigate the harmful effects of corruption on a state’s population.

Lees verder:

• The Need for an Anti-Corruption Fund, Leiden Law Blog