Many top economies fail to punish foreign bribery: report

Countries that account for nearly 40 percent of global exports fail to enforce laws and conventions against bribery, anti-corruption group Transparency International (TI) said in report on Wednesday. 

The Berlin-based watchdog assessed enforcement of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development's (OECD) Anti-Bribery Convention, which commits signatories to criminalize bribery of foreign officials.  

Read more: More than two-thirds of all countries corrupt, TI report says

Key findings

The report focused on 44 countries that account for 65 percent of world exports and found:

• 22 countries accounting for about 40 percent of global exports had "little or no enforcement" to deter foreign bribery.
• Some of the worst enforcers were Mexico, Finland, Japan, South Korea, Turkey and Russia, as well as non-signatories to the OECD convention, China and India.
• Seven countries accounting for 27 percent of global exports were deemed "active" enforcers of anti-bribery laws. 
• The US, Germany, Britain, Israel, Switzerland, Norway and Italy received this highest rating. 
• Australia, Brazil, Portugal and Sweden were the four countries that had "moderate enforcement."
• Eleven countries accounting for 12.3 percent of global exports had "limited enforcement."

China singled out

China accounts for 10.8 percent of global exports, but was at the lowest level of enforcing foreign anti-bribery commitments. The authors of the report said that as the world's largest exporter China had a "special responsibility."

"China's performance regarding international anti-corruption standards influences attitudes and behaviour in other major exporting countries," the report stated. 

China, India, Singapore and Hong Kong are not parties to the OECD convention, but have signed the UN Convention on Corruption. 

Read more: China offers Africa billions, 'no strings attached'

'Corrosive effect'

"It is unacceptable that so much of world trade is susceptible to consequence-free corruption," said Delia Ferreira Rubio, Chair of Transparency International. "Governments have promised to implement and enforce laws against bribing foreign officials under the OECD and UN conventions. Yet many are not even investigating major cases of grand corruption, which involve state-owned enterprises and senior politicians. These have an especially corrosive effect, and ultimately impact the ordinary citizens of the country the hardest."  

cw/rt (AFP, AP, dpa)

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