Financial Transparency Coalition

WASHINGTON – A recent spate of legal cases offers a preview of how anticorruption officials could pursue ill-gotten assets of toppled leaders in places like Egypt and Tunisia: Increasingly, prosecutors are going after not only corrupt politicians, but the lawyers and other professionals who may have helped them move cash.

LONDON – The governments that have frozen funds controlled by Gaddafi, Mubarak, Ben Ali and their cronies should name the banks holding their assets, anti-corruption group Global Witness demanded today. A clear message must be sent to banks that doing business with corrupt dictators is unacceptable: first, those banks holding dirty money should be publicly named and then regulators need to devise a new system which stops banks from taking suspect funds in the first place.

Raymond Baker, director of Task Force member Global Financial Integrity, appeared on two separate TV channels/shows on Friday: CBS (CBS Evening News) and Bloomberg (InBusiness). Watch Mr. Baker discuss the assets of Libyan leader Muammar Qaddafi on Friday's CBS Evening News:

The recent events in Tunisia and Egypt have demonstrated the power of citizens who won’t endure corrupt governments any longer. Their call for accountable and transparent leadership to ensure an equal distribution of public goods was heard around the world. In France, the UK and Switzerland governments heeded calls to freeze and investigate the assets of ex-president of Tunisia Ben Ali and ex-president of Egypt Hosni Mubarak and their families. There should be no impunity for those who wield power for their own benefit and not for their people. The international community...