Financial Transparency Coalition

$33 Billion Illicitly Left Libya between 2001-2009, Says Global Financial Integrity Since the forces of the Libyan Transitional Council entered Tripoli last week, Muammar Qaddafi has not been seen, presumably hiding or on the run from the revolution aimed at ending his 42-year rule.  But as pointed out on ABC News last Wednesday, much of the money he looted from the country over the past 4 decades is still at large as well. Citing Global Financial Integrity (GFI) research, ABC notes that at least $33 billion dollars left the country through illicit means in...

Nearly 5 years ago the international community, led by the United States, imposed the first in a line of increasingly harsh economic sanctions on Iran in the hopes of ending the country’s nuclear ambitions. Despite some signs of success, consensus on the effectiveness of the sanctions remains elusive. However, what is becoming clear is that sanctions are contributing to an explosion of corruption and funneling billions of dollars to Iran’s fastest growing group of kleptocrats: the Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps. The Iranian Revolutionary Guard Corps, or IRGC, is like an amalgam of the Iranian CIA, Marines, Mafia and Fortune 500....

WASHINGTON – The U.S. Department of the Treasury today announced the designation of 37 front companies based in Germany, Malta, and Cyprus and five Iranian individuals for being owned or controlled by, or acting for or on behalf of, the Islamic Republic of Iran Shipping Lines (IRISL) and its affiliates. Today's action, taken pursuant to Executive Order (E.O.) 13382, targets IRISL's complex network of shipping and holding companies and executives and further exposes Iran's use of its national maritime carrier to advance its illicit weapons of mass destruction (WMD) program and to carry military cargoes.

Sanctions are penalties imposed by a single country—or a group of countries—on a state which has taken a troublesome economic or political action. They can be economic, for example bans on exports, or they can be financial, which often bar banks from maintaining accounts in the offending country. Trade sanctions, which are often rooted in economics and not politics, include import duties, tariffs, and import or export quotas. The idea behind these restrictions is that a sanction will cause economic harm to the recipient, thereby pressuring that country into compiling with international or bilateral will. ...