DUSHANBE, December 9, 2008, Asia-Plus — A press conference dedicated to International Anticorruption Day will be held in Dushanbe today at 2:00 p.m., according to UNDP Dushanbe Office.
The press conference is organized by Tajikistan’s Agency for State Financial Control and Combating Corruption and the UNDP CO Tajikistan.
The Tajik anticorruption agency chief Sherkhon Salimzoda and the UNDP Country Director Rastislav Vrbenski will brief reporters on activities of their organizations and answer questions of reporters.
In the meantime, according to press release issued by the UNDP Dushanbe Office, the UN Secretary General Ban Ki-moon noted in his message on International Anticorruption Day that the world is reeling from a global financial crisis, caused in part by greed and corruption.
“Confidence in the financial system has been battered. The integrity of many banks has been called into question. Many people have lost their life savings,” said the UN Secretary General, “This is bad enough, yet another, silent financial crisis afflicting the world’s poorest people attracts far less attention. Every year across the developing world, billions of dollars that are badly needed for health care, schools, clean water and infrastructure are stolen or lost through bribes and other misdeeds. This makes it harder to provide basic services and achieve the Millennium Development Goals. It denies people their fundamental human rights.”
According to him, the UN Convention against Corruption, which came into force in December 2005, contains strong measures for building integrity and fighting corruption that apply to both the public and private sectors. “There is an urgent need to make the Convention work and become the global norm. I look forward to the establishment of a robust mechanism to review implementation of the Convention, which is expected to be adopted by the next conference of States Parties.”
The Un Secretary General noted that the global financial crisis also underlines the need for greater regulation. Under the Convention, bank secrecy is no longer an impediment to recovering stolen assets. The World Bank and the UN Office on Drugs and Crime are making important progress in helping States to get their money back through the Stolen Asset Recovery Initiative.
“It is not only governments and financial institutions that need to do more to prevent corruption and strengthen integrity. Corruption affects us all. It weakens democratic institutions, undermines the rule of law and enables terrorists to finance their nefarious work. On this International Day, let us all do our part to strengthen integrity, play by the rules, and turn the tide against this global menace. As UNODC”s anti-corruption campaign states, your “no” counts,” he said.
