In 2013, a whistleblower informed Denmark’s largest bank that members of Russian President Vladimir Putin’s family, and a group of accused money launderers, were using the bank’s branch in Estonia… Read more »
With a little courage and imagination, Western policymakers could dry up the illicit funds that keep autocratic leaders in power and drive real, “home-grown” democratic reforms in authoritarian countries around… Read more »
Pope Francis wrapped up a week-long visit to Latin America on Sunday in this Andean nation warning that a series of explosive corruption scandals that have tarnished current and former presidents is… Read more »
Ukraine is haltingly evolving away from a Russia-style, post-Soviet kleptocracy. But the allure of no-strings-attached Chinese cash could dampen the imperative for making reforms that Western aid packages, through their… Read more »
Democratic polities are undermined “when the virus of illicit finance, hidden in the secret channels of the global financial network, infects a democratic system that depends on trust to survive,”… Read more »
In the 1960s and 1970s, scholars studying postcolonial states began increasingly to focus on corruption as an impediment to prosperity, notes journalist Oliver Bullough, the author of The Last Man… Read more »
Ukraine’s civil society protesters are pushing for a “move from kleptocracy to democracy,” AP reports. If you ever want to feel inspired about what the United States is doing to combat kleptocracy –… Read more »
Former Georgian President Mikheil Saakashvili has called for the resignation of Ukrainian President Petro Poroshenko at a defiant impromptu rally in front of parliament in Kyiv, shortly after his supporters freed him… Read more »
The Kremlin-backed Russian Internet Research Agency operated dozens of Twitter accounts masquerading as local American news sources that collectively garnered more than half-a-million followers, Bloomberg’s Selina Wang reports: More than 100… Read more »
Targeted, personal sanctions aimed at oligarchs create a genuine problem for Vladimir Putin’s hold on power, notes analyst Natalie Nougayrède. Russia is an authoritarian kleptocracy. The elite’s loyalty to the… Read more »