New UN anti-corruption treaty helps poor: Annan

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Last updated at: (Beijing Time) Saturday, November 01, 2003

New UN anti-corruption treaty helps poor: Annan

United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan on Friday welcomed the adoption of an anti-corruption convention by the UN General Assembly, hailing it as a "remarkable" achievement.

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United Nations Secretary-General Kofi Annan on Friday welcomed the adoption of an anti-corruption convention by the UN General Assembly, hailing it as a "remarkable" achievement.

"Corruption hurts the poor disproportionately -- by diverting funds intended for development, undermining a government's ability to provide basic services, feeding inequality and injustice, and discouraging foreign investment and aid," he said in a speech to the 191-nation assembly.

"Corruption is a key element in economic under-performance and a major obstacle to poverty alleviation and development."

Negotiating the new convention and adopting it were remarkable achievements and the accord complemented another landmark instrument, the United Nations Convention against Transnational Organized Crime, which entered into force a month ago, he said.

The anti-corruption treaty "makes a major breakthrough by requiring member states to return assets obtained through corruption to the country from which they were stolen," he said.

"Corrupt officials will, in future, find fewer ways to hide their illicit gains. This is a particularly important issue for many developing countries where corrupt officials have plundered the national wealth and where new governments badly need resources to reconstruct and rehabilitate their societies."

The convention, which took 130 UN member delegations two years to draft, has 71 articles covering topics that include public procurement, bribery, illicit enrichment, embezzlement, misappropriation, money-laundering, protecting whistle-blowers, freezing of assets and cooperation between states.

It calls on governments to establish in their national laws a long statute of limitations for prosecuting cases and to enable themselves to suspend the statute "where the alleged offender has evaded the administration of justice." ��

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