A century ago there was no need for such a case to be made. Unions acted as the hammer of the working class, beating down the bosses and nailing down victory upon victory for workers. It is a sad day when the labor movement loses its militancy as that means that the working class has lost one of its weapons in the fight for its lot. As a class born out of contradiction and born into conflict, workers have deplorably few organizations representing their interests; unions are often the largest – spanning the most industries and amassing the highest membership. We have no other choice but unionization which means we have no other choice but to reinvigorate the militancy within the unions.

To be militant is to be open to and prepared for conflict in the aim of advancing a political goal. Our goal is to advance the cause of the working, and all other oppressed, masses. Are we so foolish as to suppress our own organs for carrying out that struggle? Unions were once home to close comrades in the struggle to noticeably improve their collective conditions, but now they are home to a class of labor lieutenants and aristocrats that, like the capitalists during the death of feudalism, have placed themselves outside and above the ranks of those they supposedly represent. By telling workers to “get organized” and join a union we may as well be selling them a shovel to dig their own grave with because that is what unionization in these dire and trying times amounts to. How far we have fallen when the organization that used to stand up to the bosses and demand more, demand something above bread crumbs, is now sitting at the table with the bosses, indeed, making backroom deals with them.

We need a return to militancy in the labor movement because that is what every landmark victory for working people was won on. Without a tough, militant labor movement there is no eight hour workday. Militancy proves to the working class that labor is innumerably more powerful than lobbying. These were movements that people could truly be proud of – that brought about meaningful change that we still feel today. Workers saw a grizzly bear that they knew would have their back, that they knew would say and do the things that they couldn’t say or to do to their greedy bosses; nowadays, workers see a lamb being led to slaughter by capitalists. According to Pew Research Center, over 40% of Americans hold that unions negatively affect the United States. This, of course, can not be chalked up to one reason definitively, but un-militant trade unions reflect a weakening in demands for labor-friendly legislation and education regarding worker organization.

How We Lost Our Way

We have abandoned workers. It is no surprise then that the workers have abandoned the organizations which have played a role in their own downturn. If we want to see a revitalized labor movement then we need to resuscitate the organization of the worker. More precisely, we must revive all that which is militant, strong, disciplined and revolutionary about the unions while firmly abandoning all that which is reactionary. Let’s be clear, the working class left unionization behind after unionization left us behind first. The reality remains that workers are sequestered from labor organizing while, in the United States at least, we are all victims of a fictitious two-party system where we are so lucky as we get to choose our oppressors. Looking at the history of the labor movement, we shouldn’t be surprised that when it comes down to bringing substantial change, the working class is on their own. It is time, no, rather it is long overdue, that we take back the organizations that make us strong in the fight for our rights. We can give unions their strength, their appeal, their working class tenacity back by reigniting the militant fire that sits at the very core of labor organizing.

Working people and their unions won massive victories for everyone by not being afraid of a fight, by not being afraid to stand up directly to employers, by not being afraid of things getting worse before they get better. How can unions be expected to stand up to employers when the union stewards are getting their pockets lined by the same folks they are supposed to be bargaining against? You cannot seriously expect workers to win against employers when the organization representing the workers takes bribes and backroom deals, yet it happens all the time. Labor racketeering may seem like a thing of the past, of the golden age of organized crime, but, sadly, this is not the case. Nowadays, threats of violence have been replaced by threats of retaliation against employees, but the effects are quite similar: the working class is screwed over, benefits are not received, and workers often end up in worse conditions than before “bargaining.” Unfortunately, our government has not noticed this problem, or more likely they have but they do not care to implement solutions.

The Path Forward

How do you get rid of bribery between employers and union officials in these organizations? There needs to be less incentive to take bribes and more incentive to report officials and incidents involving bribes. We must demand real consequences for corruption and real protections for those who expose it. On the other hand, I believe we need much greater incentive to speak up and speak out against this injustice. For that reason, I propose that whistleblowing in the labor movement be federally protected from retaliation and punishment. Workers need to know that it is not only their right but indeed their obligation to report such instances to the Labor Relations Board. But no working person, and rightfully so, is willing to put themselves in harm’s way to clean the unions; it isn’t their responsibility, they are likely to face whiplash, and they have zero incentive to do so when they feel truly powerless. A new labor movement that begins by cleaning its own ranks of those who only look out for themselves shows the working class a dedication to rebuilding a powerful, but clean and disciplined, labor movement willing to do whatever necessary for its workers, and indeed wanting all workers to take a much more active role in bargaining for better. We cannot revive militancy in the labor movement without first purging it of the corrupt elements that sap its strength and betray its mission.

At its core a union is a fighting organization. Hence, it must be willing and able to strike both figuratively and literally. Direct action such as employee walkouts, organized marches, picketing, rallies, etc. are how we project the strength and voice of workers everywhere. But militancy isn’t just about strikes and pickets, it’s about discipline, education, and mastery of the law. A sharp legal strategy can be just as powerful a weapon as a walkout. There is a severe lack of action being taken by unions because they fear a severe lack of discomfort and potential retaliation against them. Labor’s struggle is a protracted and vicious war against forces with better resources, connections, money, and influence. This is very clearly a guerilla war pitting the forces of David against a truly oppressive Goliath. Labor and law were once joined together in the fight, virtually inseparable from one another. Nowadays, labor occupies one side, the side of the working class, while law has found itself interlocking fingers with big business against workers. Unions have so much potential, but that potential cannot be fully realized, that is to say that the working class can not use its full power, unless they become experts on labor laws and rights. It’s quite like smithing a longsword but forgetting to sharpen it on the day of battle, we are blunting the revolutionary potential of working folks. A unified force of laborers and lawyers strikes fear into the hearts of exploitative capitalists. Our legal representation must be masters of their fields capable of fighting against expansive, and expensive, legal teams who do everything in their capabilities to firmly consolidate power into the hands of employers.

Unions were once the training grounds for the working class where they could become steeled in grassroots organization and labor politics. We must rebuild the labor movement around unions that are both prepared and willing to do whatever necessary to advance working causes. Unions will once again become revolutionary training grounds which take in the unorganized and give them the tools to unite as one against a more powerful enemy. Workers will rise from the unions as soldiers fighting on the side of labor. We are an unorganized, splintered, and, by all relativity, weak labor movement. We ought to study history and see that it is when militancy is introduced into the working class that we win victories once thought unimaginable. We only have to open our eyes to see that if we are not willing to be militant then our enemies certainly are. We cannot limit ourselves to a “parliamentarian” struggle against the very forces that dominate parliament and keep legislation from passing, or ever being introduced in the first place.

Let us learn from our labor forefathers that militancy is a great thing for an oppressed force to have. Change occurs when people are pushed past the limits of acceptance. Have we not been pushed past the limits of acceptance as we sit back and watch a dying labor movement that, in the United States, officially represents under 10% of workers? We run the dire risk of seeing the remnants of the labor movement, the movement that won us paid vacation, sick days, safe working conditions, an eight-hour workday, etc., reduced to ash. The solution to this might as well be slapping us in the face: get militant and get organized. Make unions a staple of the working class again. Make unionization the norm rather than a rarity. Make unions fighting organizations again. We have so much potential and untapped power, but we do the work of our opponents when we limit ourselves.

Let us become a class of fighters once more. Let us bring back the fight to employers!

This content originally appeared on Dissident Voice and was authored by Andrew Lehrer.

“American corporations that engage in criminal bribery schemes abroad will no longer be prosecuted. That’s the bottom line of the new Trump policy on the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. This gift from the Trump administration to corrupt multinational corporations would be an outrage at any time, but it is particularly heinous that these authoritarians are simultaneously legalizing corporate crime while cheering the use of unrestrained excessive force against immigrants and protestors in Los Angeles.

“Like the Trump DOJ’s abandonment of Boeing’s prosecution for breaching the deal to clean up its act after the deadly 737 Max crashes, this retreat from enforcing laws against corporate crime is a perversion of justice that further concentrates the administration’s power to corruptly reward insiders and punish perceived enemies.”

This content originally appeared on Common Dreams and was authored by Newswire Editor.

“Turkish authorities in Ankara must take the threats made against journalist İsmail Arı and his relatives seriously and take decisive steps to better ensure their safety,” said Özgür Öğret, CPJ’s Turkey representative. “The authorities should swiftly and comprehensively investigate the threats and hold those responsible to account, so all journalists in Turkey can safely do their jobs.”

Arı, based in the capital Ankara, said in a post on X that he filed a criminal complaint on May 16 notifying authorities that he was insulted, threatened and sent a list of his relatives via messaging app by an unknown foreign number earlier in the day, and at least one of his relatives was threatened in a phone call, according to the complaint reviewed CPJ.

Arı told CPJ via messaging app on Monday that the police provided a “caution protection” number for him to call and report incidents for 90 days. The journalist also contacted the Interior Ministry about the matter but did not receive a reply as of Monday evening.

Arı was previously targeted with death threats in late 2023 in connection with his reporting on an Islamist group in southern Turkey.

CPJ’s emailed request for comment to Turkey’s Interior Ministry, which oversees the police, did not receive a reply. 

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by CPJ Staff.

The closed-door trial was held in the city’s pretrial detention center, with authorities reportedly classifying the case as secret.

“With Tajik authorities having all but obliterated the independent press over the past decade, the hefty sentence meted out to Ahmad Ibrohim shows the lengths they will go to stamp out critical reporting,” said Gulnoza Said, CPJ’s Europe and Central Asia program coordinator. “Tajik authorities should immediately release Ibrohim, along with seven other journalists serving lengthy sentences on retaliatory charges, and reform the country’s repressive media environment.”

Law enforcement officers in Kulob arrested Ibrohim on August 12 on charges of bribing a state security services officer.

Radio Ozodi, the local service of U.S. Congress-funded broadcaster Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty, reported that Ibrohim’s arrest appeared to have been a setup.

The only independent outlet in Tajikistan’s southern Khatlon Province, Payk has previously complained of pressure from local authorities in retaliation for critical reporting.

Radio Ozodi also reported that investigators questioned around a hundred local officials who had paid Payk for services such as for subscriptions or purchases of Ibrohim’s books, and that prosecutors summoned around 20 of them to appear in court — alleging that Ibrohim had extorted them.

Ibrohim denied the charges. In a letter to Rustam Emomali, the chairman of parliament and son of Tajikistan’s president, reviewed by CPJ, he said that none of those who testified in court had said that he extorted them, only that they subscribed to his newspaper. He described the extremism allegation as “risible,” saying he had spent his life fighting against extremism and had been threatened by Tajik members of the militant Islamic State group over his articles on the subject.

A source familiar with the journalist’s case, who spoke on condition of anonymity, fearing retaliation, told CPJ that Ibrohim had defended himself, as lawyers either demanded excessive fees or refused to take the case for fear of reprisal.

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by CPJ Staff.

In an October 25 resolution, Peru Supreme Court Judge Juan Carlos Checkley ordered the Attorney General’s office to compel IDL-Reporteros to turn over audio recordings that were part of its 2018 investigation into judicial corruption and to interrogate Gorriti, its editor-in-chief.

“It is appalling that the Peruvian judicial system is being used to prosecute IDL-Reporteros and Gustavo Gorriti for their work investigating issues of public interest,” said Cristina Zahar, CPJ’s Latin America program coordinator, in São Paulo. “CPJ insists that freedom of expression and the right to maintain confidential sources be respected.”

The resolution came in response to a request from César Hinostroza, a fugitive former Supreme Court judge who fled to Belgium. Hinostroza, whose recorded conversations with government officials formed part of IDL-Reporteros’ 2018 investigation, is under investigation for corruption and influence peddling.

Gorriti told CPJ that the aim of Checkley’s order is to get IDL-Reporteros to reveal the names of its sources from the 2018 investigation. “No matter what happens, we are not going to reveal our confidential sources,” he said via messaging app.

Adriana León, spokesperson for the Lima-based Institute for Press and Society, told CPJ that Peru’s constitution protects the rights of journalists to maintain the secrecy of confidential sources.

There was no response to CPJ’s calls to the Attorney General’s office.

 A 1998 IPFA awardee, Gorriti is Peru’s most prominent investigative reporter. In 2009, he founded IDL-Reporteros, the journalism arm of the Legal Defense Institute, an independent organization dedicated to fighting corruption and improving justice in Peru.

Partly as a result of IDL-Reporteros’ scoops, dozens of Peruvian public officials, lawyers, judges, and business people are under investigation for criminal acts. But there has also been a fierce backlash against IDL-Reporteros and Gorriti, who has been targeted by right-wing protesters and government officials.

In July 2018, CPJ reported that police and prosecution officials went to IDL-Reporteros’ office to demand they hand over materials used in stories about government corruption, but left after they were unable to show a warrant.

In March 2024, a public prosecutor in Lima launched a bribery investigation of Gorriti for allegedly promoting the work of two public prosecutors in exchange for scoops about political corruption investigations. Gorriti has called that investigation “absurd.”

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by CPJ Staff.

Amidst this controversy, a press release allegedly from the Adani Group has gone viral on social media. The release purportedly contains a warning to those protesting against the company in Kenya. It threatens to reveal the names of government shareholders who have benefited from the agreements and claims it will publish the names of individuals who have accepted bribes from the Adani Group.

Dr. Aniruddha Malpani shared the alleged press release from his X handle, stating that it suggested Adani had publicly admitted to paying bribes, implying that this was a practice they also followed in India (Archived link)

Supreme Court lawyer Sanjay Hegde tweeted about the alleged press release, questioning the judgement of the Adani Group’s public relations department. He pointed out that admitting to bribery in such a manner would be incredibly damaging. Hegde later deleted the tweet, stating that the letter might be fake and he would wait for confirmation of its authenticity. (Archived link)

Have been waiting for a clarification or denial from @AdaniOnline but nothing so far. However many people say the letter is fake. Till the authenticity is confirmed @zoo_bear, I will temporarily delete the original tweet. pic.twitter.com/ylIuhtTFfz

— SANJAY HEGDE (@sanjayuvacha) September 16, 2024

Fact Check

Upon close inspection, the language and format of the press release appear dubious, suggesting it might be fake. The alleged press release uses a threatening tone and openly admits to bribery, which is highly unusual and detrimental for any company’s public image. It seems unlikely that any organisation would issue such a damaging statement about itself.

In addition, the logo in the header and the signature of “Kishan Dutt Tiwari, Country Manager of Adani Energy Solutions Limited, Kenya,” in the footer seem to have been cut and pasted from different sources. There is a noticeable difference in the clarity between the letter’s body text and the logo and signature, indicating possible manipulation. Additionally, the Adani Group’s logo appears to be superimposed onto the document.

The official X handle of the Adani Group declared the viral press release was fake. The Adani Group issued a statement denying the authenticity of any press release related to Kenya, calling it a “deceitful act.” They urged the public to disregard the fake release and mentioned that they would take legal action against those involved in spreading these falsehoods.

Know more: https://t.co/P8Ybq6c8YI pic.twitter.com/aIcBvh6CSf

— Adani Group (@AdaniOnline) September 16, 2024

To sum up, several social media users shared a fake press release while raising concerns about the Adani Group allegedly admitting to bribery in dealings with the Kenyan government. 

The post Adani Group: Viral ‘press release’ with admission of bribery in Kenya is fake appeared first on Alt News.

This content originally appeared on Alt News and was authored by Abhishek Kumar.

“Following the wave of lengthy convictions against journalists in Tajikistan since 2022, the arrest of Ahmad Ibrohim is yet another reminder of how dangerous any form of critical journalism is in the country’s deeply repressive media environment,” said Gulnoza Said, CPJ’s Europe and Central Asia program coordinator. “Tajik authorities should release Ibrohim, along with seven other journalists currently incarcerated in retaliation for their work, and allow the media to operate freely.”

Law enforcement officers in the southern city of Kulob arrested Ibrohim on August 12, but the arrest was not reported until August 16, according to a report by U.S. Congress-funded Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty’s Tajik service, known locally as Radio Ozodi, and a local media expert, who spoke to CPJ on condition of anonymity, fearing reprisal.

Local sources familiar with the case told Radio Ozodi that Ibrohim’s arrest appeared to have been a setup. Authorities have refused to extend Payk’s license to operate since March, those sources said, and a state security services officer who had spent several months cultivating a relationship with Ibrohim told the journalist that he could help obtain a license for 2500 somoni (US$235). After Ibrohim handed over the money, he was arrested.

Payk, the only independent media outlet in Tajikistan’s southern Khatlon Province, has previously complained of pressure in retaliation for its critical reports on local authorities.

If convicted on the bribery charges, Ibrohim could face up to 10 years in prison, under Article 320, Part 2 of Tajikistan’s criminal code.

CPJ emailed Tajikistan’s prosecutor general’s office for comment but did not receive a reply.

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by Committee to Protect Journalists.

It is clear in this that even the French republic, despite having a narcotics grade addiction to the international arms industry, thought that Thales might have gone just that bit far.  Some 65 investigators from the Nanterre-based office responsible for battling corruption, financial and fiscal offences have been thrown into the operation.  A further twelve magistrates from the National Financial Prosecutor’s Office (PNF), with the assistance of the European agency Eurojust, aided by Dutch and Spanish officials, have all been involved in this sprawling enterprise.

The police raids arise from two separate investigations.  The first, starting at the end of 2016, involved suspicions of corruption pertaining to a foreign official, criminal association and money laundering.  The topics of interest: the sale of submarines to Brazil, along with the construction of a naval base.

The second commenced in June 2023, with claims of suspected corruption and influence peddling, criminal conspiracy and money laundering connected with the supply of military and civilian equipment to overseas clients.

Giving little by way of details, a spokesperson for Thales insisted that the corporation “strictly complies with national and international regulations.” It had “developed and implemented a global compliance program that meets with the highest industry standards.”  That, it may well turn out, is precisely the problem.

The company propaganda on such compliance with national and international regulations is plentiful and fabulously cynical.  After a time perusing such material, one forgets that this is a defence outfit much dedicated to sowing the seeds of death, a far from benign purpose.  Group Secretary and General Counsel Isabelle Simon, for instance, is quoted as saying that the company, over the course of two decades “has developed a robust policy on ethics, integrity and compliance, which are the foundations of our social responsibility and the key to building a world we can all trust.”

The anti-corruption policy, so it is claimed, is also “regularly reviewed and updated to reflect increasingly strict international rules and requirements on corruption and influence peddling,” a point “further strengthened by Thales’s progress towards ISO 37001 certification.”

Typical of the guff surrounding modern organisational behaviour, the company wonks assume that workshops and training sessions are the way to go when inspiring a spirit of compliance.  There more sessions you run, and the more do you do, the more enlightened you become.  In boasting about its “zero tolerance on corruption,” we are told that 11,270 “training sessions on corruption and influence peddling were delivered in 2019-2020.”

Other features are also mentioned to ward off any suspicions, among them a code of conduct intended to stomp on any corrupt practices, a “corruption and influence peddling risk map,” a disciplinary system, an anti-bribery management system and an internal whistleblowing program.

The presence of such measures tends to be cosmetic.  Even defence contractors need to show an iota of principle and “social responsibility”.  But an iota is what it remains.  As Bernard Keane of the Australian publication Crikey observes, “bribery might be a tool in Thales’ arsenal for dealing with defence officials around the world, along with stringing out negotiations for its own ends and refusing to comply with request [sic] for tender requirements”.

The last point Keane makes is of particular interest to Australian lawmakers, given the referral by the country’s defence department of a lucrative 10-year contract inked with Thales in 2020 to the National Anti-Corruption Commission (NACC).  The contract covers the management of two Commonwealth-owned munitions facilities at Mulwala in New South Wales and Benalla in Victoria.

The referral was prompted by a report by the Australian National Audit Office (ANAO), which found the extent Thales had wooed Australian officials in a skewed tender process.  A bottle of champagne, for instance, had been solicited by a defence official in the course of discussions, one that also involved providing Thales with confidential information. This all worked swimmingly for the official in question, given that he later joined the company.

Thales also got what it wanted, effectively bypassing, with the blessing of the defence department, a competitive tender process.  This took place despite a 2017 offer from the global munitions company, NIOA, and the ANAO’s own recommendation to pursue an appropriate tender option.  All in all, the audit found that “Defence’s management of probity was not effective and there was evidence of unethical conduct.”

This is putting it mildly, given that Thales had not only been involved in drafting the criteria for the request for tender (RTF) documents (some 28 workshops were held for that purpose between October 2018 and August 2019), but did so deficiently.  In October 2019, this very point was made by the Defence Department, which noted no fewer than 199 “non-compliances” by the company against the RTF.

Apart from giving officialdom their time in the sun of oversight and regulation, chastening investigations into corruption do little to alter the spoliation that arises from the defence industry.  Defence contractors are regularly feted by government authorities, often with the connivance of the revolving door.  Yesterday’s officials are today’s arms sales consultants.  The defence sector, notably for such countries as France, is simply too lucrative and important to be cleansed of its unscrupulousness.  Even as these investigations are taking place to ruffle Thales, the Brazilian military establishment, by way of example, has happily continued doing business with the French weapons giant.

In February last year, the defence group trumpeted securing a contract with the Brazilian Airspace Control Department (DECEA) for the supply and installation of ADS-B ground surveillance stations to improve the safety of commercial civil aviation.  The effort is not negligible: 66 stations to be installed in over 20 Brazilian states.

On June 17, the company announced the acquisition by the Brazilian Air Force of the Ground Master 200 Multi-mission All-in-one (GM 200 MM/A) tactical air surveillance radars.  With much bluster, the announcement goes on to describe such radars as giving the user “superior situational awareness for air surveillance, as well as ground-based air defence (GBAD) operations up to Mid-Range Air-Defence (MRAD).”  Some gloating follows: “The contract signed with the FAB consolidates Thales’ position as a leader in the radar market in Brazil.”  One can only wonder how many palms were greased, and local regulations breached, for that to happen.

This content originally appeared on Dissident Voice and was authored by Binoy Kampmark.

A Papua New Guinea MP, Peter Isoaimo, who had been ousted by the National Court in an alleged bribery case, has been reinstated by the Supreme Court on appeal.

A three-member Supreme Court bench found that the National Court had erred in finding that Kairuku MP Isoaimo had committed bribery and ousting him in a Court of Disputed Returns trial in June last year.

The National Court judge, Justice Teresa Berrigan, then ordered a byelection. However, this was overturned last Friday on appeal.

• READ MORE: Other PNG politics reports

Outside court, Isoaimo’s lawyer George Kult confirmed that Isoaimo can now return to Parliament and continue serving the people of Kairuku district in Central province.

Justice Susan Purdon-Sully handed down the decision on behalf of the two other judges, Panuel Mogish and Jacinta Murray. She said the earlier decision by Justice Teresa Berrigan last year had been quashed.

The three-member bench found that the petition had a “pleading deficiency” in that the bribery was done with the knowledge and authority of Isoaimo and that he had aided his campaign coordinator Maso Makuri in committing the offence.

They found that the petitioner, Paru Aihi, had failed to notify Isoaimo of the facts of the allegation which he could have responded to. They upheld Isoaimo’s appeal in that Justice Berrigan erred on mixed law and fact.

‘Basic yet fundamental’
“Pleadings draw evidence which is the most basic yet fundamental feature of a petition,” Justice Sully read.

“Where an allegation is serious in nature the onus is on the petitioner to prove to the entire satisfaction of the court.”

The judges found that the failure to plead facts of the allegation contravened section 208 (a) of the Organic Law on National and Local Level Government Elections.

Outside court, a teary-eyed Isoaimo said it had been embarrassing to deal with the wrong National Court decision which had then “seemed like the truth”.

However, he said his two decades of reputation built through parliamentary leadership had gained him loyal supporters.

“I am thankful for my supporters, now it’s time to get back to work as we have a lot to do,” he said.

Isoaimo is a member of the National Alliance and will bolster the NA’s ranks in government.

Melyne Baroi is a PNG Post-Courier reporter. Republished with permission.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

On March 27, Alcides Chinchay, a public prosecutor in the capital city of Lima, opened a preliminary investigation into Gorriti, the editor-in-chief of Lima-based investigative news website IDL-Reporteros, for alleged bribery, according to news reports and a statement from the Peruvian Attorney General’s office.

Chinchay is examining whether Gorriti, in his stories for IDL-Reporteros, promoted the work of two public prosecutors in exchange for journalistic scoops about their investigations into political corruption, according to the judicial notification from the Attorney General’s office that was sent to Gorriti. 

The 15-page notice, which CPJ has reviewed, also states that Gorriti does not have the right to maintain the anonymity of his sources, and within five days the journalist must reveal to the Attorney General’s office the telephone numbers he used between 2016 and 2021.

Adriana León, spokesperson for the Lima-based Institute for Press and Society, told CPJ that Peru’s constitution protects the rights of journalists to maintain the secrecy of confidential sources. 

“Peruvian authorities should stop forcing Gustavo Gorriti to reveal his sources, drop this investigation, and respect the reporter’s right for secret communications,” said Carlos Martínez de la Serna, CPJ’s program director, in New York. “Journalists should be able to report on issues of public interest free of judicial harassment and retaliation for their work.”

Gorriti is Peru’s most prominent investigative reporter and the founder of IDL-Reporteros, the journalism arm of the Legal Defense Institute, an independent organization dedicated to fighting corruption and improving justice in Peru. Since 2015 IDL-Reporteros has published exposés about corruption within Peru’s judicial system and about Odebrecht, a Brazilian construction firm that admitted to paying $800 million in kickbacks to politicians across Latin America in exchange for public works contracts.

Partly as a result of IDL-Reporteros’ scoops, dozens of Peruvian public officials, lawyers, judges and business people are under investigation for criminal acts. But there’s also been a fierce backlash against IDL-Reporteros and Gorriti, who has been targeted by right-wing protesters and government officials. 

In July 2018, CPJ reported that police and officials from the public prosecutor’s office went to IDL-Reporteros’ office to demand they hand over materials used in stories about government corruption. The officials left after they were unable to show a warrant justifying the search.

Gorriti told CPJ that his interactions with the public prosecutors constituted a normal relationship between a journalist and his sources and called the preliminary investigation “absurd.” He said that IDL-Reporteros would defend the right of journalists to maintain anonymous sources and to publish exposés of public officials “no matter what the cost.” 

There was no response to CPJ’s calls to the Attorney General’s office. However, in its statement, the institution insisted that it did have the right to access Gorriti’s sources. 

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by Committee to Protect Journalists.

Davis-Besse Nuclear Plant. Photo: NRC.

It was called “likely the largest bribery money-laundering scheme ever perpetrated against the people of the state of Ohio.” And the shoes are still dropping. Or should that be ankle monitors? Because these latter belong to the three latest criminals indicted for their roles in a scheme that saw FirstEnergy hand over $61 million in bribes to Ohio politicians and their co-conspirators to secure favorable legislation.

That bill, known as HB6, guaranteed a $1.3 billion bailout to FirstEnergy in order to keep open its two failing Ohio nuclear power plants, Davis-Besse and Perry, as well as struggling coal plants. The nuclear portion of the bill has since been rescinded, but Ohio consumers are still paying to prop up two aging coal plants, to the tune of half a million dollars a day, amounting to an extra $1.50 a month on every ratepayer’s electric bill.

The $61 million bribery plot was the mastermind of then speaker of the Ohio House, Larry Householder, who is now a household name in Ohio for all the wrong reasons. He was sentenced last June to 20 years in prison for his part in the conspiracy. GOP Chairman Matt Borges, was also found guilty of racketeering conspiracy and sentenced to five years in federal prison. Both men say they will appeal.

Householder may have been the instigator, but in those earlier trials, FirstEnergy was described as a company that went “looking for someone to bribe them”. They found willing accomplices among politicians but also in the person of then Ohio Public Utilities Commission chairman, Samuel Randazzo.

So on February 12, yet more indictments were handed down, this time to Randazzo and the two FirstEnergy executives who corrupted him — former CEO Charles Jones, and former senior vice president of external affairs, Michael Dowling.

Their list of crimes, including a collective 27 felonies, was announced at a press conference by Ohio Attorney General Dave Yost. But although the presence of their company had been requested, the accused were not there.

With more than a hint of resignation in his voice, Yost said at the press conference that “the counsel representing these men assured us that they would turn themselves in this morning at eight thirty AM at the Summit County jail. They did not fulfill that promise and I suppose I am unsurprised that they would not keep this promise either.”

However, Jones, Dowling and Randazzo evidently decided it would not be such a good idea to go on the lam and all three did did appear the next day, rather sour-faced and slightly sinister-looking, to face arraignment in a courtroom scene that could have been cast in Hollywood (although perhaps with more flashy A-list attorneys). All three, of course, pled not guilty.

Perhaps in light of their Monday morning no-show, the court did not lift the pre-arraignment bonds of $100,000 each, nor the order for Dowling and Randazzo to continue wearing GPS ankle monitors — Jones can carry his due to medical reasons. Randazzo was restricted to movement within three counties while Dowling was forbidden from leaving the state. Jones was viewed as the greatest flight risk and was forbidden, for now, from returning to his Florida home — lest he flee to, of all places, Cuba!

Householder, somewhat of a gangster lookalike himself, was described during his earlier trial as “the quintessential mob boss, directing the criminal enterprise from the shadows and using his casket carriers to execute the scheme.”

The mainstream national press has scarcely reported any of this. Maybe they view it as a local story. But this kind of nuclear corruption has also occurred in South Carolina and Illinois, culminating in multiple indictments and prison sentences. It’s possible we could yet see something similar go down in Georgia as electricity rates there soar to pay for the two late-arriving and over-budget Vogtle reactors, the second of which just started fissioning earlier this month.

Why does the nuclear industry find itself mired in these kinds of criminal conspiracies? Because it has no chance of standing on its own financial feet. Meanwhile, cheaper, faster, more job-friendly renewable energy industry options are leaving nuclear power behind in a cloud of radioactive dust.

This economic collapse has, in turn, put pressure on politicians to make things right for their corporate nuclear friends, something Senator Joe Manchin and others are currently working hard to do on Capitol Hill.

So there may yet be more shoes (and ankle monitors) to drop and it’s going to be very interesting to see who’s wearing them.

This article originally appeared on Beyond Nuclear International.

This content originally appeared on CounterPunch.org and was authored by Linda Pentz Gunter.

U.S. President Joe Biden has called for the House of Representatives to quickly pass a bill that would provide billions of dollars in aid to Ukraine, challenging Republicans lawmakers to take a stand against Russian President Vladimir Putin and vote in favor of the spending package.

Biden urged immediate passage of the bill in comments at the White House on February 13 after House Speaker Mike Johnson (Republican-Louisiana) sharply criticized the $95.3 billion aid package for Ukraine, Israel, and other countries, casting serious doubts on its future just hours after it passed the Senate.

"I urge speaker Johnson to bring it to the floor immediately, immediately," Biden said, adding that it is "critical" for Ukraine.

Johnson said in a statement late on February 12 that the bill was “silent on the most pressing issue facing our country" -- border security provisions that Republicans had insisted be included in the bill, casting doubt on its chances of passing the House.

Biden didn't mention border security in his comments from the White House but reminded Republicans that the United States "stands up for freedom" and stands strong for its allies.

"We never bow down to anyone, certainly not to Vladimir Putin, so let's get on with this," Biden said. "We can't walk away now. That's what Putin is betting on."

Biden, a Democrat, warned Republicans in the House who think they can oppose funding for Ukraine and not be held accountable that "history is watching" and a failure to support Ukraine at this critical moment "will never be forgotten."

He also criticized recent comments by former President Donald Trump about NATO as "dangerous" and "shockingly un-American."

Biden reiterated Trump's claim that he told NATO allies that if they didn't spent enough on defense, he would encourage Russians to "do whatever the hell they want."

"Can you imagine a former president of the United States saying that?" Biden asked. "No other president in our history has ever bowed down to a Russian dictator. Let me say this as clearly as I can. I never will," he added.

He accused Trump, the current front-runner in the race to become the Republican party's presidential nominee, of looking at NATO as if it were a "burden" and failing to see an alliance that "protects America and the world." To Trump it is a "protection racket," and he doesn’t understand that NATO is built on the fundamental principles of freedom, security and national sovereignty, he said.

The U.S. president also stressed that the bill also provides funding for other U.S. national-security priorities in the Middle East, where the U.S. military has launched numerous attacks against militias backed by Iran, and money to help defend Israel in its fight against Hamas, which has been designated a terrorist organization by the U.S. and the EU.

It also provides funding to support U.S. national-security goals in Asia, Biden said, saying this is the "responsibility of a great nation."

In Kyiv, Ihor Zhovkva, deputy director of President Volodymyr Zelenskiy's office, told RFE/RL that the bill's passage by the Senate was "a very serious signal," and a "strong decision" was expected from the House of Representatives.

The bill passed the Senate by a vote of 70-29, and Zhovkva said the approval of 70 senators will make it difficult to find reasons for not voting for the bill.

"We have every reason to hope that the corresponding strong decision will be approved in the House of Representatives," Zhovkva noted.

This content originally appeared on News - Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty and was authored by News - Radio Free Europe / Radio Liberty.

Journalists and media workers have criticised comments made by Aotearoa New Zealand’s newly-elected Deputy Prime Minister Winston Peters — who claimed that a 2020 Labour government media funding initiative constituted “bribery” — as a threat to media freedom.

The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) reports that it has joined its union affiliate, E Tū, in strongly disputing Peters’s comments, and urging the minister and other politicians to uphold New Zealand’s “proud tradition of press freedom”.

Peters has repeatedly accused reporters of receiving bribes and engaging in corrupt practices.

• READ MORE: Former broadcast minister defends NZ journalism fund, state-funded media independence
• Is Winston Peters right to call state-funded journalism ‘bribery’ – or is there a bigger threat to democracy?

Peters’ remarks relate to the participation of several media outlets, public broadcasters, and media initiatives in the Public Interest Journalism Fund (PIJF), a media support programme established in the wake of the covid-19 pandemic.

Speaking to journalists covering the first cabinet meeting of New Zealand’s new government on November 28, Peters asked journalists what they “had to sign before they get the money”, criticising the media professionals present for their perceived lack of transparency.

That same day, Peters claimed he was “at war” with the mainstream media, reports the IFJ.

On November 27, Peters accused the state-owned broadcasters Radio New Zealand (RNZ) and Television New Zealand (TVNZ) of accepting bribery, questioning their editorial independence and calling the funding initiative indefensible.

On November 24, Peters criticised media covering the new coalition’s signing ceremony for failing to give enough media coverage before the election, calling the journalists “mathematical morons”.

Avoided reporters’ questions
Since the release of the final election results on November 3, Peters has avoided questions from political reporters.

Peters is the only coalition leader to have not engaged with political reporters since the results were confirmed.

The PIJF was designed to address the dramatic ad revenue drop-off in 2020. The fund provided NZ$55 million (US$34 million) from 2021 and 2023 and was designed to support local news initiatives, specific projects, trainings, and public interest media.

On November 23, Peters, alongside the conservative National Party leader Christopher Luxon, who is now Prime Minister, and the libertarian ACT party, announced the formation of New Zealand’s sixth National-led government, following elections in October.

The E Tū said in a statement: “By spreading misinformation and supporting conspiracy theories, Mr Peters is placing journalists at risk. We urge Mr Peters, as well as other senior politicians and public figures, to support and protect our independent media, not attack it.

“While journalists strongly reject Mr Peters’ claims, we will all continue to cover him, New Zealand First, and all parties in an unbiased way.

“The media has an important role to play in a democracy, holding politicians to account and acting as a watchdog for the community.

“Our journalists’ daily work helps support and protect an environment of free debate and wide-ranging input, and we hope and trust all our political leaders’ efforts do, too.”

The IFJ said:“Peters’ ‘war’ on journalism is deeply concerning, especially from the deputy leader of a democratic nation.

“Misinformation spread by a senior political leader can validate dangerous conspiracy theories, and can endanger journalists and media workers. The IFJ strongly urges New Zealand’s senior politicians to uphold press freedom.”

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by Pacific Media Watch.

A pair of Chinese scam artists wanted to turn a radiation-soaked Pacific atoll into a future metropolis. They ended up in an American jail instead.

How they got there is an untold tale of international bribery and graft that stretched to the very heart of the United Nations.

The stakes could scarcely have been higher for Hilda Heine, the former president of the Marshall Islands.

• READ MORE: Flashback: The Rongelap and the boat and the bomb story
• The full OCCRP investigation
• Other reports on Rongelap and the scam

A new OCCRP investigation reveals details of how Chinese-born fraudsters Cary Yan and Gina Zhou paid more than US$1 million to UN diplomats to gain access to its headquarters in New York, before embarking on a controversial plan to set up an autonomous zone near an important US military facility in the Pacific Ocean.

For years, Hilda Heine’s remote archipelago nation of just 40,000 people was best known to the world for Cold War nuclear testing that left scores of its islands poisoned.

Sitting in the centre of the Pacific Ocean, the country was a strategic but forgotten US ally.

But the arrival of a couple of mysterious strangers threatened to change all that. With buckets of cash at their disposal, the Chinese pair, Cary Yan and Gina Zhou, had grand plans that could have thrust the Marshall Islands into the growing rivalry between China and the West, and perhaps fracture the country itself.

Public controversy
First proposed in 2017, while Heine was still president, Yan and Zhou’s idea raised public controversy.

With backing from foreign investors, the couple planned to rehabilitate one irradiated atoll, Rongelap, and turn it into a futuristic “digital special administrative region.”

The new city of artificial islands would include an aviation logistics center, wellness resorts, a gaming and entertainment zone, and foreign embassies.

Thanks in part to the liberal payment of bribes, Yan and Zhou had managed to gain the support of some of the Marshall Islands’ most powerful politicians. They then lobbied for a draft bill that would have given the proposed zone, known as the Rongelap Atoll Special Administrative Region (RASAR), its own separate courts and immigration laws.

Heine was opposed. The whole thing reeked of a Chinese effort to gain influence over the strategically located Marshall Islands, she told OCCRP.

The plan was unconstitutional and would have created a virtually “independent country” within the Marshall Islands’ borders, she said.

The new Chinese investor-backed zone would also have occupied a geographically sensitive spot just 200 km of open water away from Kwajalein Atoll, where the US Army runs facilities that test intercontinental ballistic missiles and track foreign rocket launches.

Became a target
But when President Heine argued against the draft law, she became a target herself. In November 2018, pro-RASAR politicians backed by Yan and Zhou pushed a no-confidence motion to remove her from power.

She survived by one vote.

Even then, the president said she had no idea who this influential duo really were. Although they seemed to be Chinese, they carried Marshall Islands passports, which  gave them visa free access to the United States. Nobody seemed to know how they had obtained them.

“We looked and looked and we couldn’t find when and how they got [the passports],” Heine said. “We didn’t know what their connections were or if they had any connections with the Chinese government.

“But of course we were suspicious.”

The plan came to an abrupt end in November 2020, when Yan and Zhou were arrested in Thailand on a US warrant. After being extradited to face trial in New York, they pleaded guilty to a single count of conspiracy to bribe Marshallese officials.

Both were sentenced earlier this year. Zhou was deported to the Marshall Islands shortly after her sentencing, while Yan is due for release this November.

But although the federal case led to a brief burst of media attention, it left key questions unanswered.

Who really were Yan and Zhou? Who helped them in their audacious scheme? Were they simply crooks? Or were they also working to advance the interests of the Chinese government?

OCCRP spent nearly a year trying to find answers, conducting interviews around the world and poring through thousands of pages of documents.

What reporters uncovered was a story more bizarre — and with far broader implications — than first expected.

Aubrey Belford, Kevin G. Hall and Martin Young are investigative writers for the Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP). Republished with permission.

• Read the full OCCRP investigation

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

Lt. Gen. Moe Myint Tun, 55, was the seventh-highest leader in the State Administration Council, the governing junta. He had been sanctioned by the United States and other nations.

He was abruptly removed from his positions as chairman of the Myanmar Investment Commission, Foreign Exchange Supervisory Committee, and Central Committee on Ensuring the Smooth Flow of Trade and Goods, the regime said in a statement issued Monday. 

Earlier this month, authorities arrested Moe Myint Tun, said to have accepted millions of dollars in bribes from businesspeople during the past two years, but it wasn’t clear if he would be tried. 

He is under house arrest and being interrogatad in the capital Naypyitaw, according to businesspeople who declined to be named for safety reasons.

His removal is part of a crackdown on trade and finance officials, businesspeople and exporters amid economic turmoil and sanctions as the junta struggles to accumulate foreign revenue and soaring commodity prices, sources say.

Lawyer Kyee Myint said that even if the top military generals were found to be corrupt, the junta’s top leader Snr. Gen. Min Aung Hlaing would not put them on trial, but only remove them from their positions.

“They will never admit that their members are corrupt,” he said. “That’s why their case will never get to the court. I don’t think they will be charged under any article of the law but just removed from their positions. They will remove these officials to make it appear that only a few of them were corrupt.”

Easy to exploit power

His chairman positions were given to Gen. Mya Tun Oo, another member of the State Administration Council. Moe Myint Tun had been appointed to those posts on Feb. 2, 2021, a day after the military seized control of the elected government in a coup d'état.

Legal experts and political analysts said the scandal shows that high-ranking military officers can easily exploit their posts, and that effective action should be taken against Moe Myint Tun if he is found guilty of bribery and corruption. 

A retired brigadier general, who also spoke on condition of anonymity for safety reasons, said authorities should prosecute Moe Myint Tun according to military regulations if the allegations are true. 

“Corruption should not occur at any level,” he said. “Since it is customary in our country for people to give gifts to show respect, it encourages corruption. They don’t happen to notice that they are committing corruption while showing respect like that.”

Several governments, including the United States, Canada, the United Kingdom and the European Union have imposed sanctions on Moe Myint Tun for his role in the military coup, the subsequent military and police repression of peaceful demonstrators, the killing of civilians, and the gravity of Myanmar’s human rights’ abuses.

The sanctions include the freezing of any assets in these countries, a ban on transactions with their citizens, and travel bans. 

Another recent case

Earlier this month, the junta arrested another high-ranking military official — Gen. Yan Naung Soe, joint secretary of the Central Committee on Ensuring the Smooth Flow of Trade and Goods — amid the crackdown and an investigation of Commerce Ministry officials, the online news outlet Myanmar Now reported. 

The committee is responsible for procuring U.S. dollars for trade licensing purposes and other commercial transactions. 

Authorities arrested and interrogated him before Moe Myint Tun was fired. Afterwards, the junta summoned businesspeople from various sectors for questioning in Naypyitaw, said an import and export entrepreneur, who requested anonymity for security reasons.

The lieutenant general was sacked based on their testimony, he said.

Authorities also summoned former Interior Minister Lt. Gen. Soe Htut and Deputy Commerce Minister Nyunt Aung, according to Yangon-based businesspeople. RFA has yet to confirm this information.

Moe Myint Tun, Yan Naung Soe and Nyunt Aung have allegedly made millions of dollars from their  dealings with traders and by benefiting from the disparity between Myanmar’s official exchange rate of 2,100 kyats to the U.S. dollar and the market rate amid a steep decline in the kyat’s value, Myanmar now reported on Thursday.

Worsening corruption

Nay Phone Latt, spokesman for the Prime Minister’s Office of shadow National Unity Government – made up of former civilian leaders and anti-junta activists – said corruption among top military officials has been common for decades and has grown worse under the ruling junta.

“Military rulers in our country have always worked for their own self-interest and the interest of their families, causing public poverty,” he said. “Lately, we’ve seen such corruption becoming worse.”

Junta spokesman Maj. Gen. Zaw Min Tun did not respond to calls for comment.

Thein Tun Oo, executive director of the pro-military Thayninga Institute for Strategic Studies, said he did not know the reason for Moe Myint Tun’s removal, and that there was a lot of speculation concerning frequent position changes of top military leaders.

There were only two or three changes in the positions of top military leaders under the State Law and Order Restoration Council (1988-97) or the State Peace and Development Council (1997-2011), two previous military juntas that ruled Myanmar, he said.

Translated by Myo Min Aung for RFA Burmese. Edited by Roseanne Gerin and Malcolm Foster.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Burmese.

A Radio New Zealand Pacific journalist has alleged that an Indonesian official attempted to both bribe and intimidate him following an interview at the Melanesian Spearhead Group (MSG) leaders’ summit in the Vanuatu capital of Port Vila last month.

The International Federation of Journalists (IFJ) and its affiliates, the Media Association Vanuatu (MAV) and the Alliance of Independent Journalists (AJI) Indonesia, have condemned the attempted bribery and harassment of the journalist and urged the relevant authorities to thoroughly investigate the incident.

On August 23, RNZ Pacific journalist Kelvin Anthony reported that a representative of the Indonesian government, Ardi Nuswantoro, attempted to bribe him outside Port Vila’s Holiday Inn Resort after Anthony conducted an exclusive interview with Indonesia’s Australian ambassador, Dr Siswo Pramono.

• READ MORE: Indonesia responds after claim official attempted to bribe RNZ Pacific journalist
• AJI slams treatment of White House reporter by Indonesian officials at ASEAN Summit
• Other West Papua reports

According to Anthony, Nuswantoro had previously expressed the Indonesian government’s displeasure at RNZ’s coverage of ongoing independence efforts in West Papua, reported the IFJ in a statement.

The journalist had advised him of the outlet’s mandate to produce “balanced and fair” coverage and was invited to the hotel for the interview, where he questioned Dr Pramono on a broad range of pertinent topics, including West Papua.

Following the interview, Anthony was escorted from the hotel by at least three Indonesian officials. After repeatedly inquiring as to how the journalist was going to return to his accommodation, Nuswantoro then offered him a “gift” of an unknown amount of money, which Anthony refused.

Anthony reported that he felt harassed and intimidated in the days following, with Nuswantoro continuing to message, call, and follow him at the conference’s closing reception.

Interview not aired
RNZ chose not to air the interview with Dr Pramno due to the incident.

In response to the claims of bribery and intimidation sent to the Indonesian government by RNZ, Jakarta’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Asia Pacific and African Affairs director-general Abdul Kadir Jailani said, “bribery has never been our policy nor approach to journalists . . . we will surely look into it.”

In a September 6 interview, New Zealand Prime Minister Chris Hipkins reiterated his government’s commitment to press freedom, stating the importance of free and independent media.

Journalists and civil society in West Papua have faced increasing threats, restrictions and violence in recent years. Indonesian media has disproportionately reflected state narratives, with state intervention resulting in the censorship of independent outlets and effective barring of local or international journalists from Indonesian-administered Papua.

In February, renowned Jubi journalist Victor Mambor was subject to a bombing attack outside his Jayapura home.

Pacific Journalism Review: How Indonesian media amplifies the state’s narrative on the Free West Papua movement. #westpapua #indonesia #humanrights https://t.co/J3Rj0Ulhzs pic.twitter.com/9ygIo6KjWN

— Human Rights Monitor (@hurimonitor) September 12, 2023

MAV said: “The Media Association of Vanuatu (MAV) is concerned about an alleged bribery attempt by foreign officials at a Melanesian Spearhead Group regional meeting.

MAV president Lillyrose Welwel denounces such actions and urges MAV members to adhere to the Code of Ethics, as journalism is a public service. She encourages international journalists to contact the association when in the country, as any actions that do not reflect MAV’s values are not acceptable.”

AJI calls for ‘safety guarantee’
AJI said:“AJI Indonesia urges the Indonesian government to investigate the incident with transparency. This action must be followed by providing guarantees to any journalist to work safely in Papua and outside.

“The Indonesian government must also guarantee the protection of human rights in Papua, including for civilians, human rights defenders, and journalists.”

The IFJ said: “Government intervention in independent and critical reporting is highly concerning, and this incident is one in an alarming trend of intimidation against reporting on West Papua.

“The IFJ urges the Indonesian government to thoroughly investigate this incident of alleged bribery and harassment and act to ensure its commitment to press freedom is upheld.”

Pacific Media Watch condemnation
Pacific Media Watch also condemned the incident, saying that it was part of a growing pattern of disturbing pressure on Pacific journalists covering West Papuan affairs.

“West Papua self-determination and human rights violations are highly sensitive issues in both Indonesia and the Pacific. Journalists are bearing the brunt of a concerted diplomatic push by Jakarta in the region to undermine Pacific-wide support for West Papuan rights. It is essential that the Vanuatu authorities investigate this incident robustly and transparently.”

According to a CNN Indonesia report on September 6, Indonesian authorities denied the attempted bribery and harassment allegation.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by Pacific Media Watch.

The post Undue Nuclear Influence: Is It Lobbying or Bribery? appeared first on CounterPunch.org.

This content originally appeared on CounterPunch.org and was authored by Linda Pentz Gunter.

Vanuatu’s newly elected Prime Minister, Sato Kilman, has spoken out on the importance of preserving freedom of speech while cautioning against its “misuse”.

Kilman shared his concerns after his election as the country’s new leader on Monday evening.

He cited instances where criticism had crossed a “red line”, raising alarm over the tone of recent political discourse.

• READ MORE: Other Vanuatu political crisis reports

In his address, the Prime Minister addressed the need to uphold respect for Vanuatu’s traditions and Christian faith, including the importance of immediately stopping behavior that tarnished individuals’ reputations.

Prime Minister Kilman acknowledged the commitment to safeguarding democracy in Vanuatu and the importance of adhering to constitutional and legal processes when considering changes to the nation’s governance structure.

He noted the recent parliamentary session, which included a motion of no confidence as mandated by the Constitution.

The Prime Minister voiced his disappointment at lawmakers themselves for violating the laws they had enacted.

Investigating allegations
He conveyed his commitment to addressing these breaches and investigating allegations of threatening gestures and bribery.

Kilman said that the motion of no confidence was fundamentally about safeguarding democracy in Vanuatu.

He assured the public that the new government would prioritise delivering essential services to the people.

The Prime Minister expressed gratitude to all the political parties that supported the government’s change and acknowledged the customary practice during a government transition.

He thanked Vanua’aku Pati president Bob Loughman and Iauko Group leader Marc Ati for their support in electing him as the Prime Minister.

Kilman also commended members from other sides of the political spectrum who proposed candidates for the prime ministership and participated in the democratic process, even though the outcome did not favour them, saying that such participation upheld democratic values.

Doddy Morris is a Vanuatu Daily Post reporter. Republished with permission.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

A Radio New Zealand journalist says an Indonesian government official attempted to bribe and intimidate him at last month’s 22nd Melanesian Spearhead Group leaders’ summit in Port Vila.

The Indonesian government has responded yesterday saying it would “surely look” into the claims.

RNZ journalist Kelvin Anthony was in Port Vila to cover the MSG Leaders’ Summit two weeks ago when he was offered “a gift” after an exclusive interview with Indonesia’s Ambassador to Australia, Dr Siswo Pramono.

• READ MORE:  Vanuatu – West Papua – MSG: An epic saga of messianic hope, betrayal, tragedy and resurrection
• Other West Papua in Vanuatu reports

The alleged bribe was offered between 1pm-1.10pm on Wednesday, August 23, in the carpark of the Holiday Inn Resort in Port Vila by Indonesian government representative Ardi Nuswantoro, Anthony said.

“I was offered an exclusive interview with the Indonesia’s Ambassador to Australia at the MSG meeting after being told earlier in the week by Ardi Nuswantoro that his government did not like what RNZ had published on West Papua and that it was not balanced,” he said.

“I advised the delegate that RNZ makes every effort to be balanced and fair and we want to get Indonesia’s side too, but we need the chance to speak on the record.”

After communicating face-to-face and online via WhatsApp — texts and call records seen by RNZ — Nuswantoro asked Anthony to visit the Holiday Inn Resort at 12pm for the interview on Wednesday, August 23.

Broad set of questions
“I interviewed Dr Pramono covering a broad set of questions including human rights issues in West Papua, the MSG meeting, and Jakarta’s intentions in the Pacific, which lasted over 40 minutes,” Anthony said.

“I thought I had an exclusive interview that went well for a strong story out of the meeting that touched sensitive but pertinent issues involving Indonesia, the West Papua issue, and the Pacific.”

Anthony said he was escorted out of the reception area at the end of the interview and accompanied by at least three Indonesian officials.

He said Nuswantoro, who he was liaising with to set up the interview, “asked me several times if I had a car and how I was going to get back”.

“I told them that my colleague from a local media who was with me was driving me back to town. As we walked to the car park, the same official continued to walk with me and just as we were about to approach the car, he said, ‘The Indonesian delegation would like to offer you token of appreciation’.”

“I asked him, ‘What’s that?’ He replied, ‘A small gift’.

“I asked him again, ‘But what is it?’ And he replied: ‘Money’.

‘I was shell-shocked’
“At that point I was shell-shocked because I had never experienced something like that in my career.

“I declined to accept the money and told him, ‘I cannot take money because it compromises the story and my credibility and integrity as a journalist’.”

Anthony said the Indonesian official looked visibly withdrawn at the rejection and apologised for offering money.

Due to the incident, RNZ chose at the time not to air the interview with Dr Pramono.

RNZ put the claims of bribery and intimidation to the Indonesian government.

In an email response, Jakarta’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs, Asia Pacific and African Affairs director general Abdul Kadir Jailani neither confirmed nor denied the claims.

“Bribery has never been our policy nor approach to journalists,” Jailani said.

“We will surely look into it,” he said.

‘I felt intimidated’
The offering of money happened while a local fixer was about five metres away “seeing everything unfold” waiting at the car, Anthony said.

“My local fixer saw and heard everything and as we drove off he said I should report on it but only when I am out of Vanuatu. I immediately communicated the incident to my superiors back in Wellington to put everything on record,” Anthony said.

The local ni-Vanuatu journalist, who was present when the alleged incident occurred, said: “I saw what was happening and knew exactly what the Indonesian guy was trying to do”.

“My advice to the RNZ journalist was to hold the story until he was out of the country because I was worried about his safety.”

RNZ has seen communications sent by the Indonesian official to the journalist, asking him when RNZ was going to publish the interview.

“I did not respond to the messages or calls. I did, however, encounter the Indonesia delegation representatives and the official who offered me the money on Thursday, August 24, at the closing reception of the MSG leaders’ meeting at the Warwick Resort Convention Centre,” Anthony said.

Official kept following him
He said the same official kept following him around and messaged him a video clip showing indigenous Papuans carrying out violent acts.

“I felt a little intimidated but I tried to stick around with the local journalists as much as I could so I could avoid the Indonesian officials coming up to me,” he said.

Another local media representative who was at the farewell function on Thursday, August 24, said they could “see the Indonesian delegate moving around the RNZ journalist continuously and following him everywhere he went”.

“It seemed obvious that one particular Indonesian delegate was pestering Kelvin and following him around,” they said.

In Indonesia’s official response to the allegations, Abdul Kadir Jailani said “we have no interest in following nor intimidating any journalists covering the Summit”.

MSG meeting coverage
RNZ was the only international media which had a journalist on the ground to cover the MSG meeting for its Pacific audience.

The MSG is an important sub-regional bloc that includes Fiji, FLNKS — the Kanak and Socialist Liberation Front, an umbrella group for pro-independence political parties in New Caledonia — Papua New Guinea, Solomon Islands and Vanuatu.

The meeting had a packed agenda and the issue of full membership of the United Liberation Movement for West Papua (ULMWP) was a big-ticket item.

Indonesia, an associate member of the MSG, had the largest delegation at the meeting and has been on record saying it does not support or recognise the ULMWP as a representative body of the indigenous Papuans.

Dr Pramono said Jakarta views the ULMWP as a “secessionist movement” and walked out of the meeting when the movement’s representatives made interventions.

The MSG meeting concluded with leaders rejecting ULMWP’s application to become a full member of the sub-regional group.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by Pacific Media Watch.

The Jakarta District Court heard the case of alleged bribery and gratification against suspended Papua governor Lukas Enembe on Monday with evidence from expert witnesses saying that an audit showed records to be “clean and accurate”.

The hearing was convened to hear the testimony of three expert witnesses on the allegations against Governor Enembe.

The panel of judges heard the testimony of two experts Dr Muhammad Rullyandi, SH, MH (a constitutional law expert and lecturer at the Faculty of Law of Jayabaya University) and Dr Eko Sambodo, SE, MM, Mak, CFrA (an expert in state finance and losses), and the third witness was due to be heard today.

• READ MORE: Ailing suspended Papuan governor Enembe now in detention cell after army hospital
• Other Lukas Enembe case reports

The experts concluded that nine reports provided by the country’s state financial audit board during Enembe’s tenure as a governor did not contain any irregularities, or misreporting.

It was all “clean and accurate” within the framework of regulations and procedures, the witnesses said.

Complied with admin law
According to Dr Rullyandi (Indonesians often have single names), the state financial management complied with administrative law, which was supervised by a state institution known as the Badan Pemeriksa Keuangan (BPK), the State Financial Audit Board.

“The BPK is the final step in the state management process, starting with planning, implementation, and before accountability, it is under supervision,” Dr Rullyandi said.

Among the BPK’s responsibilities were the supervision of procurement and service contracting. When the BPK found criminal elements under its supervision, it reported them to the authorised agency required by law, he said.

Dr Rullyandi said that this was regulated in Article 14 of Law No. 15 of 2004 concerning the Examination of State Financial Management and Responsibility.

Article 14 of Law No.15 of 2004 states:

(1) “If criminal elements are detected during the examination, the BPK shall make an immediate report to the appropriate authorities in accordance with the applicable laws and regulations”.

Therefore, before the findings could be prosecuted as articles of bribery or gratification, they must first be tested by the BPK, which then reports them to law enforcement agencies.

Administrative rules
That is the correct way of thinking, said the expert witness.

Law enforcement is not permitted to enter the administrative area while it is still in the administrative process. The law states that when administrative law enforcement occurs, law enforcement should not enter before the BPK makes recommendations,” Dr Rullyandi continued.

The BPK audit report indicates that there were no criminal indications of financial irregularities during the term of Governor Lukas Enembe in regional financial management, including no alleged irregularities in procurement processes for goods and services, which indicates that the principle of legal certainty was met.

According to Dr Rullyandi, initiation of the investigation process into an alleged criminal act of corruption against Governor Lukas Enembe was not based on BPK’s recommendations.

This means, from the beginning of the investigation until it was transferred to the court, investigators ignored Law No. 15 of 2004, especially Article 14. To enforce the law of corruption, relating to criminal norms regulating bribery and gratification, administrative law norms must be considered.

This is accomplished by referring to Law No 1 of 2004 concerning the State Rreasury, which states in section weighing letter c that state financial administration law rules must govern state financial management and accountability.

According to Dr Rullyandi, there is also a provision in Law No. 15 of 2004 pertaining to the Responsibility of State Financial Inspection and Management, which regulates how state finances are handled and held accountable in the fight against criminal corruption.

Abuse of office allegations
“Regarding allegations of abuse of office, Dr Rullyandi said the defendant did not possess the qualifications to abuse his position through bribery and gratification as stated in Articles 11, 12A, and 12B of the Law.

Law No. 31 of 1999 concerning the Eradication of Corruption, as amended by Law No. 20 of 2001.

It was due to the authority or power associated with Enembe’s position, which allowed him to move in order to do or not do something related to the procurement of goods and services. This was given as a result of or caused by something he did or did not do in his position that violated his obligations.

His position as Governor and as user of the budget had been delegated and handed over to the powers of budget users and officials authorised to carry out the procurement committee for goods and services in accordance with Article 18 of Law No. 1 of 2004 concerning the State Treasury.

Particularly, anyone signing or certifying documents related to the letter of evidence that is the basis for the expenditure on APBN / APBD is responsible for its content and consequences.

According to Dr Eko Sambodo’s testimony, if a province [such as Papua] had been given nine times the Unqualified Fair Opinion (abbreviated WTP), administratively, all of them had been managed in accordance with relevant regulations, accountability, and accounting standards.

“When it comes to managing finances, it has been audited, so there are no regulatory violations,” Dr Sambobo said.

Governor Enembe’s senior lawyer, Professor OC Kaligis, asked the witness whether this opinion of the WTP could be used as evidence, that corruption did not exist in the province.

The witness replied that in auditor terms, corruption was known as irregularities. Deviation causes state losses.

It means that everything has been done according to and within regulations, including governance, compilers, and reports. It also means that expenditures have been proven, clarifications have been made, all of which contribute to its final report.

“This is all WTP offers,” said Dr Sambobo. Under the leadership of Governor Enembe, Papua province won the WTP opinion nine times consecutively.

Another expert opinion was due to be heard in court today.

Witness’s testimonies in Court
The court completed hearing witnesses last week (Monday, August 21), who testified to their involvement or knowledge of the alleged bribery, gratification, and corruption scandal.

Out of 184 witnesses, only 17 were brought to court, and only 1 had any connection with Governor Enembe. Sixteen of these witnesses testified as to not have any connection to Enembe.

Only one witness linked to the governor’s name, Prijatono Lakka, a pastor and Enembe’s assistant, who sent Enembe one billion rupiah (NZ$105,000) to cover medical expenses through governor’s personal funds, resulting in an array of allegations, his arrest, and the ongoing process.

To date, no witnesses have emerged to provide testimony or evidence concerning all the alleged wrongdoings and misconduct of Lukas.

Although the governor’s health has improved somewhat, his condition is still critical. The governor’s lawyers continues to ask the judge to detain him in the city for medical treatment and to allow medical specialists outside of the control of Corruption Eradication Commission (acrynomed KPK) to treat him in a free environment.

However, these requests have not been responded to. Currently, the governor is confined to the prison cells of KPK.

He is secheduled to appear in court next week on Monday to bring the final stages of this protracted legal drama to closure.

Lukas Enembe’s term as Papua’s provincial Governor will end during early September — next week.

Yamin Kogoya is a West Papuan academic who has a Master of Applied Anthropology and Participatory Development from the Australian National University and who contributes to Asia Pacific Report. From the Lani tribe in the Papuan Highlands, he is currently living in Brisbane, Queensland, Australia.

• Other Yamin Kogoya articles

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

RNZ Pacific

The deposed Papua Governor Lukas Enembe has been indicted this week on charges of bribery, allegedly over about US$3 million.

The amount of bribes in this indictment is far greater than the Corruption Eradication Commission’s initial allegation, when naming Enembe as a suspect at the end of 2022.

The commission’s public prosecutor alleges that the money was given to the defendant in  an act that went against his duties.

• READ MORE: Critical D-day over Papua governor Lukas Enembe’s legal nightmare?
• Other Governor Enembe reports

However, Enembe and his legal team strongly deny the allegations.

The defence team said no credible evidence had been presented.

Enembe’s declining health has been a constant concern for his supporters, who claim the outspoken leader’s arrest in January was politically motivated.

Earlier this week, Asia Pacific Report correspondent Yamin Kogoya reported that Enembe faced a critical “D Day” hearing about his controversial case as he had been seen as a critic of the Indonesian administration in Papua.

“His drawn out ordeal has been full of drama and trauma,” reported Kogoya.

“There has been indecisiveness around the case and the hearing date has been repeatedly rescheduled — from 20 more days, to 40 more days, and now into months.”

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

In a summons dated May 31, which CPJ reviewed, Judge Blamo Dixon of Criminal Court C in the Liberian capital Monrovia ordered the management and entire staff of the privately owned daily newspaper FrontPageAfrica to appear on Tuesday, June 13, to defend a report about alleged bribery in the country’s judicial system.

The court summons is related to a May 19 report that quoted anonymous sources who alleged that US$500,000 was “splashed around judicial circles to influence the jury” that unanimously acquitted four men charged with trafficking US$100 million of cocaine, according to FrontPage Africa Managing Editor Rodney Sieh and News Editor Lennart Dodoo, who both communicated with CPJ via messaging app. Sieh said his publication stood by the story.

 The summons said FrontPageAfrica’s management and “all persons acting under the scope and authority” of the newspaper must appear before the court that acquitted the four men, explain why they should not be held in criminal contempt, and provide evidence of the bribery. 

The penalty for contempt of court is at the judge’s discretion but can include imprisonment or a fine based on the court type, according to Sieh, a revised schedule of court costs, fees, and fines, and Ambrose Nmah, a spokesperson for Liberia’s judiciary, who spoke to CPJ by phone. Circuit courts, which is the court that summoned the outlet’s management and staff, can issue up to a $300 fine.

In court papers filed on Monday and reviewed by CPJ, FrontPageAfrica said it had not intended to “blame, embarrass or denigrate” the trial court or Liberia’s judiciary, and would not “publish any story for the purpose of ridiculing, bringing into disrepute or undermining the dignity of this Honorable Court and the Judiciary at large.”

“Liberian authorities should respect journalists’ sacrosanct duty to protect their sources and withdraw a summons recently issued to FrontPageAfrica employees over the outlet’s coverage,” said Angela Quintal, CPJ’s Africa program coordinator, in New York. “The acquittal of four alleged international drug traffickers is a matter of public interest, and the journalists who have reported critically about the court and have since apologized if they inadvertently caused offense must not become scapegoats.”

In the drug case, the court also ruled that US$200,000 that the Liberian government seized from the four men must be returned, and hours after the verdict, the four men fled the country and have “not been seen or heard from since,” according to FrontPageAfrica.

The drug case was widely believed to be a “slam dunk case” as the bust was made in the presence of both U.S. and Liberian drug enforcement authorities, and video evidence was published by the outlet, other international news outlets, and on social media platforms.  

Justice Minister Frank Musah Dean attempted to rearrest the suspects and launch an appeal, which the Supreme Court rejected, that report said.   

In those court papers, FrontPageAfrica’s lawyers said that as Dean and many other Liberians were denouncing the court verdict, the newspaper’s reporters were informed of the bribes “by credible and unimpeachable sources.”

FrontPageAfrica “with all sincerity” did not think or believe its May 19 report would be construed as contemptuous, but sincerely apologized “to the extent that the publication is construed or may be construed as being contemptuous to the presiding judge, the trial court and the Liberian judiciary as a whole,” the document said.

Nmah said that the court summons was in line with Liberian laws and that FrontPageAfrica would not be held liable if they proved the facts of their reporting in court.

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by Committee to Protect Journalists.

Bribery and corruption are a way of life in North Korea because the average wage from government-assigned jobs is nowhere near enough to live on. For most people, it means they have to get a side gig or run their own businesses. 

Police and government officials, however, can make their living by using the power of their position to extract bribes from the public.

In January 2021, the government established the Justice and Discipline Investigation departments. The two offices are tasked with auditing people in positions of authority to uncover any corruption and illegal behavior and report them to the Central Committee, the governing body of the ruling Korean Workers’ Party. 

In April, the two departments spent a week investigating correctional officers at Chungsan Prison in South Pyongan province, north of the capital Pyongyang, a woman sent to Chungsan in 2019 told RFA’s Korean Service on condition of anonymity for security reasons.

Special cell

“The inspection started when a prisoner who was released from the prison reported to the Central Committee that there was a ‘special cell’ in prison camp No.11 [Chungsan Prison],” she said.

The special cell is where rich prisoners who can afford to bribe the right officials are sent to do their time. They receive preferential treatment and are exempt from hard manual labor unlike most of their fellow inmates.

Those who can’t afford to pay the bribe for the special cell can bribe their way into the cafeteria staff or livestock raising teams, according to the source. 

This is advantageous because the government does not provide food, and the prisoners must cultivate it for the entire prison population. The cafeteria workers can sneak food away, whereas the livestock raising team can eat food intended for the animals.

In any case, the special cell is the preferred choice.

The source, who was imprisoned for accepting money sent by an escapee relative who had resettled in South Korea, said that several hundred U.S. dollars is all it costs to buy special cell privileges.

“If you give US$500 a year to a correctional bureau official, he will give a call to the prison you’re going to to set you up,” she said. “If you don’t have a personal connection with a correctional official, then you can give $100 per month to the official in the prison to get into the special cell.” 

The source said she did not know how many people were in the special cell, but estimated that during her time in Chungsan, there were 20 inmates in the women’s side of the prison.

“During the inspection, two provincial correctional department officials and the head of Chungsan Prison were fired for receiving bribes and giving special treatment to prisoners,” she said.

Inmates also punished

Another source, who was released from Chungsan in April after serving a five-year sentence, told RFA that it was not only the prison officials who accepted bribes that got punished – the special cell inmates who bribed them were also in trouble.

“They are temporarily forbidden from family visits and they are also getting three years of hard labor tacked on to the backend of their sentences,” she said.

As a result of the inspection, face-to-face family visits for prisoners will only be allowed once per six months. This is an abrupt change, as normal prisoners are allowed a visit every 15 days.

The second inmate said that new prisoners will also now be separated based on their occupation and crime. Executives, wholesalers and meth dealers are separated because they have experience moving large sums of money around on the outside and are more likely to be able to afford bribes.

“These measures appear to be aimed at eradicating the source of bribes to the prison officials, but I don’t know if they will be effective,” she said.

 Translated by Claire Shinyoung Oh Lee. Edited by Eugene Whong and Malcolm Foster.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By Hyemin Son for RFA Korean.

The ministry’s Investigation Security Agency said Tuesday that it had completed its probe of the scheme and submitted its findings to the Supreme People’s Court, calling for the 54 people to be charged with giving bribes, receiving bribes, brokering bribes, abusing one’s position as a public servant and appropriating assets by fraud, according to state media.

The proposed charges stem from a case against former Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs To Anh Dung for having allegedly received 21.5 billion dong (U.S.$915,000) in bribes to add companies to a list of providers of repatriation flights. 

State media said Dung was in charge of approving the plans to organize repatriation flights based on proposals by the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ Consular Department.

In addition to Dung, the agency proposed charges of receiving bribes for Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Vu Hong Nam, Assistant to the Deputy Prime Minister Nguyen Quang Linh, Head of the Government Office’s Department of International Relations Nguyen Thanh Hai, Director General of the Ministry of Foreign Affairs’ Consular Department Nguyen Thi Huong Lan, and Vice Chairman of the Hanoi City People’s Committee Chu Xuan Dung, as well as 16 others.

Other defendants are from the ministries of public health, transport, and public security; the Civil Aviation Authority of Vietnam; the People’s Committees of Hanoi and Quang Nam province and the Hanoi Municipal People's Committee.  

The agency recommended charges of brokering bribery for Major General Nguyen Anh Tuan – the deputy director general of the Hanoi police force – and three others.

During the investigation, Tuan confessed that he had received 61.6 billion dong (U.S.$2.65 million) to help Nguyen Thi Thanh Hang and Le Hong Son – the director general and deputy director general of the Blue Sky Co. – avoid criminal prosecution for their role in the repatriation scandal. On March 31, the Ministry of Public Security removed Tuan from office and ordered him to retire. 

Vice Minister of Foreign Affairs Nam was said to have received 1.8 billion dong (U.S.$76,600) during his posting as Vietnamese ambassador to Japan to help the Nhat Minh Company to sell air tickets and accommodations at hotels as quarantine places for passengers of six flights to repatriate Vietnamese nationals from Japan. 

Nguyen Quang Linh, the assistant to Deputy Prime Minister Pham Binh Minh, was accused of receiving 4.2 billion dong or U.S.$179,000 to help some companies obtain permits to organize “rescue flights.” 

Linh was accused of violating Vietnam’s laws and working rules and regulations in advising the government on selecting enterprises participating in the organization of flights to repatriate Vietnamese nationals during the COVID-19 pandemic. 

From April 2020 to January 2022, Vietnam organized around 400 rescue flights, bringing back over 70,000 citizens from more than 60 countries and territories. Many passengers had to buy overcharged tickets and undergo troublesome procedures to get a flight home.

Translated by Anna Vu. Edited by Joshua Lipes and Malcolm Foster.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Vietnamese.

Yesterday, a federal jury largely affirmed those allegations, finding Householder and ex-Ohio Republican Party chair Matt Borges guilty of conspiracy to participate in a racketeering enterprise involving bribery and money laundering. The two men face up to 20 years in prison and will be sentenced in the coming months. 

“Larry Householder illegally sold the statehouse, and thus he ultimately betrayed the great people of Ohio he was elected to serve,” said U.S. Attorney for the Southern District of Ohio Kenneth Parker in a press release.

Borges and Householder plan to appeal the verdict. “This is just step one,” Householder told reporters after the verdict. “Stay tuned.”

The bribery scandal in Ohio is an extreme instance of a common practice of utilities wielding behind-the-scenes influence on state legislatures — often to soften renewable energy standards and subsidize the rising costs of operating old, polluting power plants. In 2020, a utility in Illinois admitted to bribing the state house speaker, and a power company in Arizona acknowledged it donated millions of dollars to dark-money groups — 501(c)(4) nonprofits that are allowed to pay for political advertising without revealing the source of the money — in an attempt to get utility-friendly candidates elected to a commission that sets electricity rates for the state. 

“You don’t have to look far to see that the FirstEnergy scandal is part of a broader trend,” Dave Anderson, communications and policy manager of the nonprofit watchdog organization Energy and Policy Institute, told Grist in an email.

The Ohio corruption scandal began with a 2008 renewable energy law. The Ohio legislature, following in the footsteps of other states across the country, passed that law mandating wind and solar projects and creating programs to help residents and businesses use less energy. As these efforts materialized across the state, the utilities that primarily relied on nuclear and fossil fuel power began to see their profits dwindle. In response, they began lobbying the legislature and spending lavishly on allied politicians’ election campaigns. 

Some of those efforts succeeded, and the legislature repealed the renewable energy mandate in 2014. But relief came too late for one of the utilities, FirstEnergy, which found itself in the red. Simultaneously, Householder was considering returning to the state House (he had previously served in the early 2000s) and was looking for cash to mount a successful campaign as well as help like-minded politicians to run for office. After Householder was elected, his team set up a dark money group, and FirstEnergy began funneling money to it.  

What FirstEnergy and other utilities allegedly got in return was a $1.3 billion bailout. Soon after Householder took charge of the speaker’s podium in 2019, he proposed House Bill 6. It was touted as an effort to improve air quality, but it mostly included bailouts for coal and nuclear power. At the same time, it scaled back energy efficiency measures and added bureaucratic hurdles to prevent the growth of wind power. The bill was eventually signed into law. An independent analysis found that it would cost Ohioans $2 billion in excess utility bills and $7 billion in healthcare costs (due to worsening pollution) over nine years. 

Despite Householder’s 2020 arrest and widespread knowledge of the scandal, only parts of House Bill 6 have since been repealed. The ratepayer-funded bailout of two coal plants — which could eventually cost as much as $1.7 billion — still remains in effect, and the state’s energy efficiency requirements have not been restored. 

There are still additional loose ends in the scandal. During the course of Householder’s trial, FirstEnergy admitted to bribing Sam Randazzo, the former chair of the Public Utilities Commission of Ohio. (Neither Randazzo nor FirstEnergy employees have been charged with any wrongdoing, and Randazzo has maintained his innocence.) The Ohio state attorney general has also filed a civil lawsuit against Householder and others seeking damages for the scandal. Separately, the attorney general has filed a complaint against Householder for using campaign funds for his legal defense.

“The convictions provide new momentum for the ongoing federal criminal investigation into utility corruption in Ohio,” said Anderson with the Energy and Policy Institute. “Hopefully, the Department of Justice will follow the evidence wherever it leads.”

This story was originally published by Grist with the headline Ohio politicians found guilty in $60 million utilities bribery scandal on Mar 10, 2023.

This content originally appeared on Grist and was authored by Naveena Sadasivam.

The President of the Federated States of Micronesia has made a series of disturbing claims against China, including alleging spying, threats to his personal safety and bribery.

President David Panuelo made the claims to his Congress, governors and the leadership of the country’s state legislatures in a letter which has been leaked to 1News.

Panuelo said the point of his letter was to warn of the threat of warfare.

• READ MORE: Other Pacific and China reports

The president, who has just two months left in office, has publicly attacked China in the past.

“We can play an essential role in preventing a war in our region; we can save the lives of our own Micronesian citizens; we can strengthen our sovereignty and independence,” he said in his latest letter.

President Panuelo said he believed that by informing the leaders of his views he was creating risks to his personal safety along with that of his family and staff.

Outlined in the letter are a series of startling allegations.

Chinese activity within EEZ
The president said there had been activity by the People’s Republic of China (PRC) within his country’s Exclusive Economic Zone.

The “purpose includes communicating with other PRC assets so as to help ensure that, in the event a missile — or group of missiles — ever needed to land a strike on the US Territory of Guam that they would be successful in doing so”.

President Panuelo said he had stopped China research vessels in FSM waters after patrol boats were sent to check “but the PRC sent a warning for us to stay away”.

He also claimed that at the Pacific Islands Forum in Suva in July last year he was followed by two Chinese men, one of them an intelligence officer.

“To be clear: I have had direct threats against my personal safety from PRC officials acting in an official capacity,” he said.

In another claim, Panuelo said that after the first China-Pacific Island Countries Foreign Ministers Meeting, the joint communique was published with statements and references that had not been agreed to “which were false”.

He said he and other leaders such as Niue Premier Dalton Tagelagi and Fiji’s now former prime minister Voreqe Bainimarama had requested more time to review the joint communique before it went out but their requests were ignored.

Trying to strongarm officials
President Panuelo also claimed China had been trying to strongarm officials when it came to bilateral agreements such as a proposed memorandum of understanding (MoU) on the “Deepening Blue Economy” which had “serious red flags”.

One of those was that the FSM “would open the door to the PRC to begin acquiring control over the island nation’s fibre optic cables and ports”.

President Panuelo said in his latest letter that while he advised cabinet to reject the MOU in June last year, in December he learned that it was back in “just mere hours from its signing”.

He said that when Foreign Minister Khandhi Elieisar raised this with Chinese Ambassador Huang Zheng, he suggested “that he ought to sign the MOU anyway and that my knowing about it — in my capacity as Head of State and Head of Government — was not necessary”.

President Panuelo said he found out Ambassador Huang’s replacement, Wu Wei, had been given a mission to shift the FSM away from its allies the US, Japan and Australia. He therefore denied the Ambassador designate his position.

“I know that one element of my duty as President is to protect our country, and so knowing that: our ultimate aim is, if possible, to prevent war; and, if impossible, to mitigate its impacts on our own country and on our own people.”

There are also allegations of bribery. President Panuelo claimed that shortly after Vice-President Aren Palik took office in his former capacity as a Senator, he was asked by a Chinese official to accept an envelope filled with money.

‘Never offer bribe again’
“Vice-President Pakik refused, telling the [official] to never offer him a bribe again,” President Panuelo said.

In October last year, Panuelo said that when Palik visited the island of Kosrae he was received by a Chinese company, which has a private plane.

“Our friends told the Vice-President that they can provide him private and personal transportation to anywhere he likes at any time, even Hawai’i, for example; he need only ask,” President Panuelo claimed.

He said senior officials and elected officials across the whole of the national and state governments had received offers of gifts as a means to curry favour.

The President concluded the letter by saying he wanted to inform his fellow leaders, regardless of the risk to himself, because the nation’s sovereignty, prosperity and peace and stability were more important.

The Chinese embassy in the Federated States of Micronesia and in Wellington have been asked to comment on the allegations by 1News.

Republished with permission.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

The President of the Federated States of Micronesia has made a series of disturbing claims against China, including alleging spying, threats to his personal safety and bribery.

President David Panuelo made the claims to his Congress, governors and the leadership of the country’s state legislatures in a letter which has been leaked to 1News.

Panuelo said the point of his letter was to warn of the threat of warfare.

• READ MORE: Other Pacific and China reports

The president, who has just two months left in office, has publicly attacked China in the past.

“We can play an essential role in preventing a war in our region; we can save the lives of our own Micronesian citizens; we can strengthen our sovereignty and independence,” he said in his latest letter.

President Panuelo said he believed that by informing the leaders of his views he was creating risks to his personal safety along with that of his family and staff.

Outlined in the letter are a series of startling allegations.

Chinese activity within EEZ
The president said there had been activity by the People’s Republic of China (PRC) within his country’s Exclusive Economic Zone.

The “purpose includes communicating with other PRC assets so as to help ensure that, in the event a missile — or group of missiles — ever needed to land a strike on the US Territory of Guam that they would be successful in doing so”.

President Panuelo said he had stopped China research vessels in FSM waters after patrol boats were sent to check “but the PRC sent a warning for us to stay away”.

He also claimed that at the Pacific Islands Forum in Suva in July last year he was followed by two Chinese men, one of them an intelligence officer.

“To be clear: I have had direct threats against my personal safety from PRC officials acting in an official capacity,” he said.

In another claim, Panuelo said that after the first China-Pacific Island Countries Foreign Ministers Meeting, the joint communique was published with statements and references that had not been agreed to “which were false”.

He said he and other leaders such as Niue Premier Dalton Tagelagi and Fiji’s now former prime minister Voreqe Bainimarama had requested more time to review the joint communique before it went out but their requests were ignored.

Trying to strongarm officials
President Panuelo also claimed China had been trying to strongarm officials when it came to bilateral agreements such as a proposed memorandum of understanding (MoU) on the “Deepening Blue Economy” which had “serious red flags”.

One of those was that the FSM “would open the door to the PRC to begin acquiring control over the island nation’s fibre optic cables and ports”.

President Panuelo said in his latest letter that while he advised cabinet to reject the MOU in June last year, in December he learned that it was back in “just mere hours from its signing”.

He said that when Foreign Minister Khandhi Elieisar raised this with Chinese Ambassador Huang Zheng, he suggested “that he ought to sign the MOU anyway and that my knowing about it — in my capacity as Head of State and Head of Government — was not necessary”.

President Panuelo said he found out Ambassador Huang’s replacement, Wu Wei, had been given a mission to shift the FSM away from its allies the US, Japan and Australia. He therefore denied the Ambassador designate his position.

“I know that one element of my duty as President is to protect our country, and so knowing that: our ultimate aim is, if possible, to prevent war; and, if impossible, to mitigate its impacts on our own country and on our own people.”

There are also allegations of bribery. President Panuelo claimed that shortly after Vice-President Aren Palik took office in his former capacity as a Senator, he was asked by a Chinese official to accept an envelope filled with money.

‘Never offer bribe again’
“Vice-President Pakik refused, telling the [official] to never offer him a bribe again,” President Panuelo said.

In October last year, Panuelo said that when Palik visited the island of Kosrae he was received by a Chinese company, which has a private plane.

“Our friends told the Vice-President that they can provide him private and personal transportation to anywhere he likes at any time, even Hawai’i, for example; he need only ask,” President Panuelo claimed.

He said senior officials and elected officials across the whole of the national and state governments had received offers of gifts as a means to curry favour.

The President concluded the letter by saying he wanted to inform his fellow leaders, regardless of the risk to himself, because the nation’s sovereignty, prosperity and peace and stability were more important.

The Chinese embassy in the Federated States of Micronesia and in Wellington have been asked to comment on the allegations by 1News.

Republished with permission.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

Sunday’s arrests include a director and two deputy directors at vehicle registration centers in the province on Vietnam’s north central coast.

The police said an investigation discovered high level staff were asking customers for between VND200,000 and VND1 million (U.S.$9-U.S.$43) to register vehicles with poor emission standards, worn tires, faulty brakes and broken lights.

Car owners who wanted to fast-track registration were asked to pay at least VND200,000.

The arrests are part of a nationwide crackdown on corrupt staff at Vietnam Register. The investigation has resulted in 120 people being investigated for offenses including giving and taking bribes and forging documents. They include a director and former director of the national vehicle registration body.

Vietnam Register Director Dang Viet Ha was charged with bribery on Jan. 11. Five days later, Transport Minister Nguyen Van Thang called a conference to review the work of Vietnam Register and described the corruption there as “painful” and “criminal protection.”

The Communist Party of Vietnam has vowed to crack down even harder on corrupt officials this year after a series of investigations in 2022 into a COVID-19 testing kit bribery scandal, a repatriation flights bribery scandal and real estate scams.

The crackdown on the two COVID corruption cases led to Vietnam’s president and two deputy prime ministers being forced to step down last month for allowing corruption on their watch.

Translated by RFA Vietnamese. Edited by Mike Firn.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Vietnamese.

On Tuesday, Ho Chi Minh City Police Department’s investigation agency said it arrested Tran Ky Hinh, former director of the Vietnam Register, for taking bribes from registration center directors across the country between 2014 and 2021.

It said 62-year-old Hinh, either directly or through the acting head of the Motor Vehicle Inspection Department Tran Anh Quan, took money in return for signing registration certificates for vehicles that weren’t roadworthy.

Also Tuesday, police in Hoa Binh province charged Trinh Thanh Cong, the director of a local motor vehicle registration center, and nine subordinates with accepting bribes. Police said they forced vehicle owners to pay the equivalent of U.S.$4 to U.S.$13 to inspectors, who then overlooked faults in order to pass the vehicles.

Last year, Cong received as much as U.S.$427 a day from his subordinates, police said.

The Vietnam Register has suspended operations at 30 registration and inspection centers across the country due to the ongoing investigation.

Register Director Dang Viet Ha was charged with bribery on Jan. 11.

Five days later, Transport Minister Nguyen Van Thang spoke at a conference called to review the work of the Vietnam Register. He described the widespread corruption as “painful,” calling the monthly bribes “criminal protection.”

Translated by RFA Vietnamese. Edited by Mike Firn.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Vietnamese.

The arrest of Dang Viet Ha came after police said they conducted investigations on 83 suspects in a nationwide crackdown on alleged corruption in offices under the agency, called the Vietnam Register.

The investigations spanned 13 registration centers, including eight in Ho Chi Minh City, Lt. Gen. To An Xo, a spokesperson at the Ministry of Public Security, told reporters on Wednesday.

On the eve of  the arrest, Vietnam’s Law Newspaper posted an online story about Ho Chi Minh City police arresting Dang Viet Ha after summoning him from Hanoi. The paper explicitly pointed to wrongdoings in his role at the Vietnam Register as the reason for his arrest. But 30 minutes after it was posted, the story was taken down without further explanation. 

On January 6, the Ministry of Transport decided to assign Nguyen Vu Hai, the deputy head of the Vietnam Register, to take over the agency as the investigation continues. 

In Dong Nai, police raided and locked down a local vehicle registration and inspection center on Jan 10th, the day before the arrest. Authorities  in Bac Ninh and Bac Giang provinces prosecuted 19 people on bribery charges relating to motor vehicle inspection on the same day. 

On Jan 11th, the Vietnam Register announced that it had suspended the operation of 30 registration and inspection centers throughout the country due to ongoing police investigations.

Translated by Anna Vu. Edited by Nawar Nemeh and Malcolm Foster. 

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Vietnamese.

Indonesian anti-curruption authorities have arrested Papua Governor Lukas Enembe on allegations of bribery.

The Jakarta Globe called the arrest by the Corruption Eradication Commission in a restaurant in the provincial capital Jayapura yesterday as “dramatic” saying it came four months after he had been named a suspect.

The arrest led to his supporters attacking a police Mobile Brigade Unit where he was being held prior to being flown to Jakarta on a chartered flight.

• READ MORE: Fate of Papua’s Governor Enembe – the ‘son of Koteka’ – lies in balance amid allegations
• Other Governor Enembe reports

The newspaper said the two-term governor is accused of taking billions of rupiah in bribes from businessmen but has resisted arrest since the commission named him a suspect in September.

Indonesia’s Financial Transaction Reports and Analysis Centre alleged Enembe made payments, amounting to US$39 million dollars, to overseas casinos.

Indonesia’s Chief Security Minister Mohammad Mahfud said in October that the central government had channelled billions of dollars in what was dubbed “autonomy funding” to Papua since 2001, with about half of that amount disbursed during Enembe’s term.

He claimed “nothing happened: the people remain poor and the officials continue their lavish lifestyle”.

• Pacific Media Watch reports that Papua province is at the heart of the indigenous self-determination struggle in West Papua.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ. 

Fate of Papua’s Governor Enembe – the ‘son of Koteka’ – lies in balance amid allegations

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

A corruption scandal involving Qatar and Morocco is rocking the European Union, with authorities in Belgium earlier this month raiding the homes and offices of multiple European Parliament lawmakers for allegedly accepting bribes from the two governments. The raids recovered hundreds of thousands of euros in cash. Among those arrested was European Parliament Vice President Eva Kaili, who in the lead-up to the World Cup repeatedly defended Qatar against critics. Ana Gomes, a retired Portuguese diplomat who was a member of the European Parliament from 2004 to 2019, says that while the investigation was initially focused on Qatar, “it looks more and more that Morocco should be the center of the investigation.” We also speak with Francesco Bastagli, a former United Nations special representative for Western Sahara, who notes that Morocco has cultivated a sophisticated network of “friends” in Europe who have helped the country in trade agreements and in gaining acceptance for its illegal occupation of Western Sahara.

This content originally appeared on Democracy Now! and was authored by Democracy Now!.

Every December, state-run enterprises submit their budget proposals to treasury officials – and bribes to keep their funding from getting reduced, sources in the country tell Radio Free Asia.

In North Korea, many institutions – utilities, schools and hospitals – rely on government funding for all of their revenue. 

If their funding declines, they will have difficulty paying wages to employees, or they may be unable to deliver vital services to the public, according to an official at one of these organizations in the coastal city of Tanchon, who talked to Radio Free Asia on condition of anonymity for security reasons.

“To get even a little more funding, [enterprises] must bribe officials who control the budget,” he said.

His organization gave government officials 20 kilograms of alcohol and 10 gasoline coupons each, – a bribe worth about U.S.$160 together, he said. “The budget review was completed without any issue.”

Authorities are reluctant to accept the bribes in cash in such an official setting, so instead, commodities that can be used, or readily be converted into cash are exchanged, the source said.

Way of life

Bribery is a way of life in North Korea, where meager government salaries are not enough to survive on. Many people pick up side jobs to make ends meet. Police and other local government officials regularly accept bribes to supplement their income, sources in the country tell RFA.

Even central government officials and high-ranking members of leader Kim Jong Un’s inner circle live off of what others will pay them in exchange for favors.

A company in the northern province of Ryanggang sent its representatives to negotiate the budget with the provincial government four separate times in November and early December, one of the company’s employees told RFA on condition of anonymity to speak freely.

 “The company officials have no choice but to go see the senior officials and bribe them,” the employee said. “It is rare for a budget submitted without bribery to be passed as is.”

If funding is cut, “the damage is passed on to residents,” the first source said. 

For example, if an urban developer loses some funding, ordinary citizens are forced to provide free labor for maintenance on roads and parks.  Or if a sewage operator gets less government support, that means residents are recruited to run water treatment facilities and clean out sewers, he said.

According to South Korea’s national bank, the North Korean government’s budget in 2021 was about $9.1 billion, less than 1/40 of the more prosperous, democratic South. 

Translated by Claire Shinyoung Oh Lee and Leejin J. Chung. Written in English by Eugene Whong. Edited by Malcolm Foster.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By Chang Gyu Ahn for RFA Korean.

Cary Yan and Gina Zhou, who use several aliases and have Marshall Islands passports, each face up to five years in prison, the U.S. Department of Justice said in a Dec. 1 statement.

They were extradited to the United States from Thailand in September after allegedly carrying out a multi-year effort to establish the semi-autonomous region that involved bribing and attempting to bribe half a dozen officials in the North Pacific nation.

“As they have now admitted, the defendants sought to undermine the democratic processes of the Republic of the Marshall Islands through bribery in order to advance their own financial interests,” said U.S. Attorney Damian Williams.

The U.S. indictment of Yan and Zhou doesn’t assert that the pair were acting on behalf of Beijing. The bribes paid were relatively small. The largest mentioned in the U.S. indictment is U.S. $22,000.

They each pleaded guilty to one count of conspiracy to violate the anti-bribery provisions of the Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA). While the maximum penalty is five years, a sentencing date has not been set. A federal district court judge will determine any sentence after considering the U.S. Sentencing Guidelines and other statutory factors, according to the department news release.

The Marshall Islands, home to about 80,000 people spread across numerous atolls, is one of the 14 states that recognize Taiwan instead of China. It is currently renegotiating its Compact of Free Association with the United States, an arrangement under which it has ceded defense and security to Washington in exchange for economic assistance and the right for its citizens to live and work in the United States.

According to the U.S. indictment, Yan and Zhou offered and paid bribes in 2018 to Marshall Islands officials to support legislation that would have created the Rongelap Atoll Special Administrative Region. 

The special administrative region would have operated under rules to attract foreign investors, such as by lowering or eliminating taxation and relaxing immigration regulations.

Between 2016 and 2018, Yan and Zhou also paid for the travel of Marshall Islands officials to New York and Hong Kong, and their hotel bills and entertainment.

They succeeded in getting legislation sponsored in 2018, but it was blocked by the Marshall Islands’ president at the time, Hilda Heine. 

One of the unnamed officials who worked with Yan and Zhou, promised the pair in an email that he would get “revenge” on Heine, according to the indictment. 

Heine was defeated in a November 2019 election and in March 2020, a resolution supporting the concept of the special administrative region was passed by the Marshall Islands legislature with the support of lawmakers who Zhou and Yan bribed or provided with other incentives.

Shailendra Bahadur Singh, an associate professor and head of journalism at the University of the South Pacific, said in an analysis published after Yan and Zhou’s extradition that their tactics were “reminiscent of ‘elite capture’, often associated with the Chinese state and Chinese businesses.”

“Although the involvement of Chinese state officials is unclear at this stage, there’s no denying that the Marshall Islands would be a prime target and major prize for them,” he said.

Part of the reason for U.S. jurisdiction in the case was that Yan was president and chairman of a New York-based non-governmental organization, which also claimed affiliation with the United Nations. Zhou was his executive assistant. 

The NGO organized a conference in Hong Kong in 2018 to promote the special administrative region and flew in Marshall Islands officials to Hong Kong for it and to New York at other times.

BenarNews is an RFA-affiliated news service.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by Stephen Wright.

Three months after their extradition from Thailand to face bribery and money laundering charges in the United States, two naturalised Marshallese citizens pleaded guilty on Friday in a New York court to conspiring to violate the US Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) in connection with a multi-year scheme to bribe government officials in the Marshall Islands to pass legislation to establish a special investment zone in this western Pacific nation.

Cary Yan and Gina Zhou had been charged with three counts each of violating the FCPA and two counts of money laundering.

They pleaded guilty to one count of conspiring to violate the FCPA and the US Attorney’s Office for the Southern District of New York dismissed the other four charges. They are naturalised Marshall Islands citizens originally from the People’s Republic of China.

• READ MORE: Two defendants plead guilty to conspiring to bribe high-level officials of the Republic of the Marshall Islands

“As they have now admitted, the defendants sought to undermine the democratic processes of the Republic of the Marshall Islands through bribery in order to advance their own financial interests,” US Attorney Damian Williams said in a statement.

“I commend the career prosecutors of this Office and our law enforcement partners for bringing this corruption to light and ensuring that justice is done.”

Yan, 51, and Zhou, 35, are awaiting sentencing. They have been held without bail pending final disposition of the case.

Yan faces a maximum five-year term in prison and a fine of up to US$200,000, while Zhou faces a maximum prison term of three years and 10 months and a fine of up to US$150,000, according to the plea agreement between their defence attorneys and the SDNY prosecutors.

“Beginning at least in 2016, Yan and Zhou began communicating and meeting with Marshall Islands officials in both New York City and the Marshall Islands concerning the development of a semi-autonomous region within a part of the Marshall Islands known as the Rongelap Atoll,” said the US indictment that was unsealed on September 2 on Yan and Zhou’s arrival in New York following extradition from Thailand.

‘Attracting investors’
“The creation of the proposed semi-autonomous region was intended by Yan, Zhou, and those associated with them to obtain business by, among other things, allowing Yan and Zhou to attract investors to participate in economic and social development projects that Yan, Zhou, and others promised would occur in the semi-autonomous region.”

Their aim was to establish the Rongelap Atoll Special Administrative Region (RASAR). But because it ran afoul of the Marshall Islands constitution and required exemption from multiple Marshall Islands legal oversight and enforcement provisions, President Hilda Heine’s administration refused to introduce the proposed RASAR legislation to Nitijela (parliament) for consideration in 2018.

Yan and leading Marshall Islands officials had officially launched the RASAR plan in Hong Kong in April 2018, but never met legal requirements to move the plan forward in the Marshall Islands.

Starting in early 2018 and “continuing until at least on or about November 1, 2018, Yan and Zhou offered and provided a series of cash bribes and other incentives to obtain the support of Marshall Islands legislators for the RASAR bill,” said the US indictment.

Heine’s administration held off the attempt to push RASAR legislation into parliament in late 2018 and survived an attempt to unseat Heine through a vote of no confidence in November.

After the national election a year later, when Nitijela reconvened in January 2020, Heine lost the presidency to David Kabua.

Shortly after the new government took office in 2020, “Yan and Zhou began emailing and meeting with certain Marshall Islands officials to continue their plan to create the RASAR,” said US prosecutors.

Law consideration
“In or about late February 2020, the Marshall Islands legislature began considering a resolution that would endorse the concept of the RASAR, a preliminary step that would allow the legislature to enact the more detailed RASAR Bill at a later date.”

US prosecutors said that in early March, “Yan and Zhou met with a close relative of a member of the Marshall Islands legislature in the Marshall Islands.

During the meeting, Yan and Zhou gave the relative $7000 in cash to pass on to the official, specifying that this money would be used to induce and influence other Marshall Islands legislators to support the RASAR Resolution.

“Yan and Zhou further stated, in sum, that they knew that the official needed more than $7000 for this purpose and that (they) would soon obtain additional cash for the official.”

US prosecutors said that at this meeting in early March 2020, Yan and Zhou “also discussed having previously brought larger sums of cash into the Marshall Islands through the United States and that they planned to do so again in the future”.

By the third week of March 2020, the Nitijela passed the RASAR Resolution “with the support of legislators to whom Zhou and Yan had provided bribes and other incentives,” said the prosecutors.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ. 

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

U.S. House Natural Resources Committee Chairman Raúl Grijalva and committee member Rep. Katie Porter are investigating an alleged bribery scheme in which they believe a real estate developer donated to a super PAC aligned in support of former President Donald Trump in exchange for pardons for two other men.

"The parallels between the Vigneto case and the Hammonds' pardons raise significant concerns about another potential case of bribery under the Trump administration."

The two Democrats wrote to Interior Secretary Deb Haaland on Friday, calling on her department to release all documents related to the pardons of Dwight and Steven Hammond, who had been convicted in 2012 of setting fires on public lands they had leased after illegally killing deer on the land. The two men were sentenced to five years in prison with time served in 2015, sparking right-wing protests including a 40-day armed occupation of Malheur National Wildlife Refuge in Oregon.

Grijalva (Ariz.) and Porter (Calif.) believe real estate developer Mike Ingram—who was the subject of the Natural Resources Committee's first-ever criminal referral regarding another potential bribery case involving a clean water permit for one of his developments—secured the Hammonds' pardons in 2018 with a $10,000 donation to the America First Action, Inc. Super PAC.

According to the letter, Ingram's assistant emailed a Trump Interior Department official on May 25, 2018, attaching two articles arguing for the Hammonds to be pardoned. On July 1, a Republican lawmaker who supported the Hammonds tweeted that Trump was "seriously considering" pardoning them.

One day later, Ingram made his donation, and just over a week after that Trump announced he was pardoning the Hammonds.

"Mr. Ingram made only one other $10,000 donation during the 2017-2018 nonpresidential election cycle," wrote Grijalva and Porter. "That donation was the subject of the committee's criminal referral regarding the Villages at Vigneto development [in Arizona]. In that case, Ingram and 12 other individuals, many of whom maintained personal or professional relationships with Ingram, donated nearly a quarter of a million dollars to the Trump Victory Fund and the Republican National Committee on the same day or within just a few days that a major federal action regarding Vigneto was made in Ingram's favor."

"The parallels between the Vigneto case and the Hammonds' pardons raise significant concerns about another potential case of bribery under the Trump administration and warrant further investigation," they added.

On social media, Porter noted that she and Grijalva uncovered the evidence of Ingram's alleged bribe "while investigating a possible $240,000 quid pro quo scheme between the Trump administration and a developer."

"We're requesting documents to help us get to the bottom of [the Ingram case]," Porter said. "I have zero tolerance for corruption."

This content originally appeared on Common Dreams - Breaking News & Views for the Progressive Community and was authored by Julia Conley.

Boston Globe journalist Joshua Miller was subpoenaed for testimony as part of a Harvard University admissions scandal criminal case in Boston, Massachusetts, on Oct. 11, 2022.

In April 2019, Miller, now the Globe’s politics editor, broke the story of bribes allegedly paid to Harvard’s fencing coach, Peter Brand, by Maryland businessman Jie Zhao. According to the Globe, Zhao purchased Brand’s house at nearly twice its value. In return, Brand allegedly helped facilitate Harvard admission for Zhao’s two sons by recruiting them to the university’s fencing team.

Two months after the Globe published the story, the Department of Justice launched a grand jury inquiry. Brand and Zhao were formally indicted on federal bribery charges in 2020.

Globe legal counsel Jonathan M. Albano challenged the 2022 subpoena for Miller’s testimony in a Nov. 3 motion to quash, arguing that it’s not vital to the government’s case.

Albano requested that the judge instead issue a protective order for an in-camera review of Miller's recorded interview with Zhao. In a written declaration submitted to the court, Miller stated that testifying would force him to disclose confidential sources he felt “duty-bound to protect” and could have a negative impact on future reporting.

“I believe this will inhibit sources from speaking to me in the future because they will not trust that our conversations will exclusively be used for news reporting,” Miller stated. “I believe they will speak less frankly to me, or not speak to me at all, since they may fear that what they tell me will become something I will later testify about in criminal or civil litigation.”

Neither Miller nor Albano responded to requests for comment from the U.S. Press Freedom Tracker.

On Nov. 8, the DOJ filed an opposition to the motion to quash, claiming only Miller can provide first-hand knowledge of Zhao’s statements to him. The federal bribery trial is scheduled to begin Dec. 5.

This content originally appeared on U.S. Press Freedom Tracker: Incident Database and was authored by U.S. Press Freedom Tracker: Incident Database.

For the first time in the life of school exams in Papua New Guinea, police will monitor the national grades 8, 10 and 12 exams over the next three weeks.

The engagement of the police is to provide security for invigilators (teachers who supervise exams) and to crack down on cheating and bribery.

Education Minister Jimmy Uguro announced the extraordinary intervention, saying that more than 200,000 students were expected to sit for the exams cross the country.

• READ MORE: Other PNG education reports

Several policemen from the Special Services Division (SSD) are now travelling into several provinces around the country — including Morobe, Madang, Eastern Highlands, Southern Highlands and Hela — as they assist the invigilators and other Education officials to carry out their duties during the three weeks of examinations.

In recent years, PNG has experienced an unprecedented rise in cheating scandals from several schools across the country and as such the inclusion of police is a way to deter such activities from being carried out.

Uguro said that cheating during the examinations would not be tolerated with students warned to be mindful as they sat for the exams.

“While we do not wish to include police officers in such activities, the safety of the invigilators and education staff is of paramount importance. People will do anything to ensure their child goes into university, however we want it to be done the right way and not through bribery and cheating,” he said.

Western Highlands cheating
The warning comes after several schools in Western Highlands in 2019 saw more than 400 students not certified because of cheating.

And several more schools in the years that have followed have seen students cheating in schools across the country.

All of the students in the three grades have been warned to not cheat during the examination with the National Education Board implementing strict rules while students are sitting for the exams.

Uguro said that while he wished the students the best of luck in their examinations, he wanted all them to know that cheating would not be tolerated and there would be severe consequences for such actions being taken by any student.

“If anyone is found to be cheating, they will be severely penalised and cheating is an attitude that is unfair, and cannot be allowed to continue,” he said.

“Those found to be cheating on any of the days for the three grades will be banned from continuing the exams, and we will be reporting any illegal activities and practices found to be carried out during the examination processes.”

Uguro said the warning was not only for the students but for the teachers and other help around the schools who were assisting with cheating.

Cheats ‘will not be certified’
“They will be dealt with by police,” he added. “If you are found cheating, the only penalty we will give is you are not going to be certified. No student and school will be certified if they are caught cheating.”

Teachers would be terminated and would never teach again, said Minister Uguro.

If teachers had been found to have assisted in cheating and bribery, they would also face not teaching again he reiterated.

For the students, those found to be cheating would be referred to the National Education Board (NEB) and appropriate action would be taken, Uguro said.

Minister Uguro also took the time to wish the students the best of luck and urged them to do their best.

“I want to wish all students the best in the exams today and I challenge them to do their best for themselves and their families and for the country.”

200,000 students start exams
Today the 200,000 students from more than 3000 schools in the country will sit for the papers with the Grade 10s commencing the start of examination.

The examination will conclude on Friday.

On October 17 the Grade 12s start their exams and end on Friday, October 21.

The third and final week will see grade 8s commence their exams on Monday, October 24, and end on Friday, October 27.

Miriam Zarriga is a PNG Post-Courier reporter. Republished with permission.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

On Saturday, September 10, uniformed officers who identified themselves as part of the prosecutor general’s office arrested Zeynalli, owner and chief editor of the independent news outlet Xural, and Sadygov, a prominent human rights lawyer who frequently defends journalists, in the capital, Baku, after a pro-government news outlet published claims that the pair extorted money from a jailed businessman in return for favorable coverage of his case, according to multiple news reports and a statement by the prosecutor general’s office.

That evening, Binagadi district court in Baku ordered Zeynalli and Sadygov to be remanded in custody for four months on charges of large-scale bribe-taking and accessory to bribe-taking, respectively, those reports said. Both charges carry a penalty of between eight and 12 years in prison under Article 311.3.3 of the criminal code of Azerbaijan, according to Bakhtiyar Hajiyev, Sadygov’s lawyer, who spoke to CPJ by phone. 

Both men denied the charges and said they believe they are retaliation for their professional work, according to those reports, Hajiyev, and Agil Layij, Zeynalli’s lawyer, who communicated with CPJ by email. The lawyers told CPJ they had filed an appeal of the decision to remand them in custody.

“Bribery charges against Avaz Zeynalli, a critical journalist whom authorities have previously jailed for his work, and Elchin Sadygov, a lawyer who regularly defends journalists against state repression, are concerning, especially as pro-government media made the accusations,” said Gulnoza Said, CPJ’s Europe and Central Asia program coordinator, in New York. “Azerbaijani authorities should free Zeynalli and Sadygov, drop the charges against them, and refrain from jailing members of the press and their advocates in retaliation for their work.”

Zeynalli also works as a presenter for Xural’s YouTube channel Xural TV, which has 215,000 subscribers; Xural and Xural TV cover human rights abuses, corruption, and those critical of the government, according to those reports and a CPJ review of their content.

On September 7, pro-government news website Haqqin published a story accusing Zeynalli of extorting 20,000 manats (US$11,800) from the family of Rasim Mammadov, the former head of a local steel factory who is currently on trial for embezzlement, in return for ceasing negative coverage of his case; and later that evening accused Sadygov, who is Mammadov’s lawyer, of acting as an intermediary.

The story included audio of a voice message sent by Zeynalli to Sadygov, in which the former defends his coverage of the businessman’s case and offers to “return” an unstated object if the latter was uncomfortable; Haqqin alleged that the object to be returned was the extorted money.

In a broadcast on Xural TV the following day, Zeynalli said the recorded voice was his but said he was offering to return documents related to the businessman’s case. Sadygov said the same to local media, adding that the Mammadov family told him Zeynalli did not extort them. 

At 3 p.m. on September 10, around seven plainclothes officers and one uniformed officer from the prosecutor general’s office detained Zeynalli at a restaurant not far from Baku city center, according to Ilkin Rustamzade, a local activist and friend of Zeynalli who was with him at the time and spoke to CPJ by phone. 

Rustamzade told CPJ that he believes authorities feared that Zeynalli and Sadygov possessed documents relating to recent threats made by Mammadov to reveal corruption among high-placed government officials.

The officers took the journalist to Xural’s editorial office, where they conducted a search and confiscated the outlet’s documents and computer hard disks, Rustamzade said; they also searched Zeynalli’s home and seized a computer, books, and 3,000 euros (US$3,040), according to a report that cited the journalist’s wife.

That evening, officers from the prosecutor general’s office arrested Sadygov, searched his office and home, and confiscated documents and his mobile phone, according to news reports and Hajiyev. 

Prominent Azerbaijani journalist Khadija Ismailova wrote on Facebook that Sadygov’s arrest “will leave dozens of activists, journalists and political prisoners without legal representation,” adding that “that, probably [is] the goal.” 

On September 12, Mammadov told authorities in court that Zeynalli had been “seeking bribes from me for years,” according to local news website Report.az. Layij told CPJ the statement was of no consequence as the businessman was on trial and was either pressured by authorities or seeking to mitigate his sentence.

Zeynalli and Sadygov are held at the State Security Service’s detention center in Baku. However, by law, they should be held at the Penitentiary Service’s pretrial detention center, Layij told CPJ, adding that it is unclear why authorities have chosen to charge them with bribe-taking, as this offense ought to be reserved for employees of the state.

Layij added that prosecutors brought the charges based solely on the media report, and no official complaint has been filed against them by Mammadov or his family. He said he received information that the general prosecutor’s office and State Security Service are allegedly pressuring the Mammadov family to testify against the pair.

CPJ reached out to the Mammadov family for comment via their lawyer but did not receive any reply. CPJ’s email to the office of the prosecutor general of Azerbaijan and phone call to the State Security Service were not answered.

Zeynalli previously served three years of a nine-year sentence handed down to him in 2012 on charges including bribery, extortion, and tax evasion deemed retaliatory by CPJ. 

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by Committee to Protect Journalists.

The complaint stems from a video investigation by Titu, which was broadcast by Ekattor TV on March 1, 2022, alleging that a local shrine’s management committee, led by Shahidul Islam Mollik, general secretary of the Mirzaganj Union Parishad, an administrative government unit, had engaged in corruption.

Mollik’s nephew, Badal Hossain, filed the complaint, which accused the journalist of violating three sections of the Digital Security Act, pertaining to defamation, unauthorized collection of identity information, and publication of false, threatening, or offensive information, according to those sources. Each of those offenses can carry a prison sentence of between three and five years, and a fine between 300,000 taka (US$3,160) and 1,000,000 taka (US $10,530). 

Titu told CPJ that after conducting research for the investigation in Mirzaganj, Hossain had called him on February 19 and urged him not to publish the report.

On February 20, Hossain came to the Ekattor TV office in the town of Patuakhali and offered the journalist a bribe in exchange for agreeing not to publish the report, according to Titu and CCTV footage of the incident, which was shown in Titu’s video investigation.

When reached via messaging app, Hossain denied the allegations that he pressured Titu not to publish the report.

Titu told CPJ that after accepting the complaint, the Barisal Cyber Tribunal subsequently ordered the Mirzaganj police station to investigate the complaint. Anowar Hossain Talukdar, the station’s officer in charge, is the vice president of the shrine’s management, according to Titu and a document issued by the Waqf Administration, a regulatory agency under the Ministry of Religious Affairs, which CPJ reviewed.

Mollik and Talukdar did not respond to CPJ’s requests for comment sent via messaging app.

Titu said that he expects to be summoned for further hearings after the police submits its investigative report to the tribunal. Under Section 40 of the Digital Security Act, investigations are to be completed within 60 days, with the possibility of extension upon court approval. Titu told CPJ that police did not complete the investigation within the 60-day period, adding that he was not informed that they were granted an extension.

Titu said he has repeatedly received direct, in-person threats from politicians and their associates for his extensive reporting on their alleged corruption. He fears these political leaders have banded together in recent months, he told CPJ, and are planning further retaliation against him, including possibly arrest.

CPJ has repeatedly documented the use of the Digital Security Act to harass journalists in retaliation for their work, and has called for the law’s repeal.

This content originally appeared on Committee to Protect Journalists and was authored by Jennifer Dunham.

“Shame on yous!” … these are the three powerful words Julie Soso, former governor and candidate for the Eastern Highlands regional seat, had to say for the newly elected members to Papua New Guinea’s Parliament — all men so far.

Soso, Carol Mayo (Vanimo-Green Open), Albertine Ehari (Kerema Open), Shelley Launa and Mary Maima (Simbu Regional), Dr Julianne Kaman and Sarah Garap from Jiwaka-based Meri I Kirap Sapotim (MIKS), an NGO, yesterday joined more than 100 women leaders from Enga and Jiwaka in condemning the manner in which the national election 2022 was conducted.

The women leaders say violence, bribery, vote rigging, controlled voting, threats compounded with selective counting and manipulation of numbers in counting centres involving the PNG Electoral Commission officials “killed all aspirations” women had to get into the National Parliament in this election.

• READ MORE: ‘Enough is enough’: the fight to elect women to Papua New Guinea’s men-only Parliament
• Women battle for seats in PNG parliament
• Papua New Guinea hasn’t had a woman in parliament for five years. This election may deliver change
• Other PNG election reports

“Young men who are supporters of contesting candidates used violence as a means to intimidate voters at polling stations,” said Dr Kaman said from Jiwaka.

“Many women and vulnerable voters gave up and went away.”

She was supported by Launa and Maima, who said the candidates and their supporters “came to fight, not to vote”.

“They told us that the regional votes were ‘pipia votes’ [‘rubbish votes’] and they sold the ballot papers,” Launa added.

‘Hired thugs’
Not only were the women and vulnerable voters confronted with candidates and their “hired thugs” who took away the ballot papers to mark themselves as voters, they were also confronted by husbands and sons who had taken bribes.

“Campaign was good. It was at the polling booths [that the intimidation happened],” Albertine Ehari, who stood for the Kerema Open, said.

“The husbands and sons took bribes from the candidates and they took over the voting from the mothers and young girls. Many gave up.”

In the Southern Highlands, the only female candidate for regional seat, Ruth Undi, and her supporters were left wondering what had become of their votes.

“There were outside ballot papers that were brought in by the disciplinary forces and we voted.”

Undi’s campaign manager, Jamson Mange, said from Mendi yesterday: “Her supporters voted for her, they came back with their reports and we are surprised that these votes are not registered on the tally boards.”

Mayo, a candidate for the Vanimo-Green electorate, said she went up against candidates with money and cargo.

“How come I have not scored any votes? There is selective counting here, the counting was controlled and manipulated,” Mayo added.

Violence on higher scale
Violence in elections in Enga is nothing new but it was on a higher scale in this election.

“We have not voted ever since because men use force to take away the ballot boxes and mark the ballots in hideouts,” an Enga woman leader said.

The women leader is among 98 others from Porgera, Kandep, Wapenamanda, Wabag and Lagaip districts who joined 40 other women leaders from Jiwaka province, who are petitioning the PNG Electoral Commission to cancel all the writs and hold fresh elections.

The women did not want their names released because they were placing their own lives — and that of their families — in danger by taking their grievances to the PNGEC and the media.

“Declaration of candidates in the Highlands is questionable. How did they get 50.1 percent of the total votes when more than 50 percent of the voter age people did not vote?” the head of MIKS non-government group, Garap, asked.

“Candidates there did not come through free, fair, participatory, non-violent elections.”

Soso remarked: “These were promoted and accepted by leaders that are now getting ready to go into government and Parliament.

Exploiting the system
“They knew the election system was poor, they knew they would use the system to get in.

“They should be ashamed of themselves,” Soso added.

The women have demanded immediate steps to be taken to make the 2027 national election safe and free for them.

Among measures proposed include a biometric system to carry out the Common Roll, the National Identification Project, and to conduct polling in the 2027 election.

Ehari said: “Elections shouldn’t be about how much money candidates or parties are spending during or before the vote.

“It should be about people working together to choose the right leader and work together to bring practical and agreed development.”

• Papua New Guinea is one of just four countries in the world without a single woman in Parliament. The 167 women who contested this year’s elections represented less than 5 percent of the total number of candidates.

Peter Korugl is a PNG Post-Courier reporter. Republished with permission.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

“Shame on yous!” … these are the three powerful words Julie Soso, former governor and candidate for the Eastern Highlands regional seat, had to say for the newly elected members to Papua New Guinea’s Parliament — all men so far.

Soso, Carol Mayo (Vanimo-Green Open), Albertine Ehari (Kerema Open), Shelley Launa and Mary Maima (Simbu Regional), Dr Julianne Kaman and Sarah Garap from Jiwaka-based Meri I Kirap Sapotim (MIKS), an NGO, yesterday joined more than 100 women leaders from Enga and Jiwaka in condemning the manner in which the national election 2022 was conducted.

The women leaders say violence, bribery, vote rigging, controlled voting, threats compounded with selective counting and manipulation of numbers in counting centres involving the PNG Electoral Commission officials “killed all aspirations” women had to get into the National Parliament in this election.

• READ MORE: ‘Enough is enough’: the fight to elect women to Papua New Guinea’s men-only Parliament
• Women battle for seats in PNG parliament
• Papua New Guinea hasn’t had a woman in parliament for five years. This election may deliver change
• Other PNG election reports

“Young men who are supporters of contesting candidates used violence as a means to intimidate voters at polling stations,” said Dr Kaman said from Jiwaka.

“Many women and vulnerable voters gave up and went away.”

She was supported by Launa and Maima, who said the candidates and their supporters “came to fight, not to vote”.

“They told us that the regional votes were ‘pipia votes’ [‘rubbish votes’] and they sold the ballot papers,” Launa added.

‘Hired thugs’
Not only were the women and vulnerable voters confronted with candidates and their “hired thugs” who took away the ballot papers to mark themselves as voters, they were also confronted by husbands and sons who had taken bribes.

“Campaign was good. It was at the polling booths [that the intimidation happened],” Albertine Ehari, who stood for the Kerema Open, said.

“The husbands and sons took bribes from the candidates and they took over the voting from the mothers and young girls. Many gave up.”

In the Southern Highlands, the only female candidate for regional seat, Ruth Undi, and her supporters were left wondering what had become of their votes.

“There were outside ballot papers that were brought in by the disciplinary forces and we voted.”

Undi’s campaign manager, Jamson Mange, said from Mendi yesterday: “Her supporters voted for her, they came back with their reports and we are surprised that these votes are not registered on the tally boards.”

Mayo, a candidate for the Vanimo-Green electorate, said she went up against candidates with money and cargo.

“How come I have not scored any votes? There is selective counting here, the counting was controlled and manipulated,” Mayo added.

Violence on higher scale
Violence in elections in Enga is nothing new but it was on a higher scale in this election.

“We have not voted ever since because men use force to take away the ballot boxes and mark the ballots in hideouts,” an Enga woman leader said.

The women leader is among 98 others from Porgera, Kandep, Wapenamanda, Wabag and Lagaip districts who joined 40 other women leaders from Jiwaka province, who are petitioning the PNG Electoral Commission to cancel all the writs and hold fresh elections.

The women did not want their names released because they were placing their own lives — and that of their families — in danger by taking their grievances to the PNGEC and the media.

“Declaration of candidates in the Highlands is questionable. How did they get 50.1 percent of the total votes when more than 50 percent of the voter age people did not vote?” the head of MIKS non-government group, Garap, asked.

“Candidates there did not come through free, fair, participatory, non-violent elections.”

Soso remarked: “These were promoted and accepted by leaders that are now getting ready to go into government and Parliament.

Exploiting the system
“They knew the election system was poor, they knew they would use the system to get in.

“They should be ashamed of themselves,” Soso added.

The women have demanded immediate steps to be taken to make the 2027 national election safe and free for them.

Among measures proposed include a biometric system to carry out the Common Roll, the National Identification Project, and to conduct polling in the 2027 election.

Ehari said: “Elections shouldn’t be about how much money candidates or parties are spending during or before the vote.

“It should be about people working together to choose the right leader and work together to bring practical and agreed development.”

• Papua New Guinea is one of just four countries in the world without a single woman in Parliament. The 167 women who contested this year’s elections represented less than 5 percent of the total number of candidates.

Peter Korugl is a PNG Post-Courier reporter. Republished with permission.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

Trong, who is also a member of the National Assembly for Hanoi, made the comment in a meeting in the capital Hanoi on Thursday, the reports said.

But online critics of the government expressed continued frustration with Vietnam’s leadership for not doing more to root out graft in the government and mismanaging the country’s response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Trong, 78, has been general secretary of the Vietnam Communist Party (VCP) — the highest position in Vietnam — since 2011, and served as the country’s president from 2018 to 2021. As head of the Politburo, Vietnam’s highest decision-making body, he is the most powerful leader in the country.

On June 6, the VCP announced it had expelled Hanoi Mayor Chu Ngoc Anh and Health Minister Nguyen Thanh Long from the party following accusations that they were involved in a U.S. $172 million scandal. They were paid by Viet A Technologies Company to provide overpriced coronavirus test kits to hospitals.

It is not unusual for senior government officials to apologize to the head of the VCP when they face high-profile corruption charges.

Oil executive Trinh Xuan Thanh, who was convicted of embezzling assets from units of Vietnam’s state-owned oil company, and Nguyen Bac Son, a former minister of information and communications imprisoned for accepting a U.S. $3 million bribe, both expressed remorse for their actions.

Musician Tuan Khanh from Ho Chi Minh City told RFA that the Trong’s response to the Viet A Technologies scandal has been insufficient.

“He merely performed a simple act of expressing anguish and regret when the party members and those in top positions were penalized and dismissed from the party,” he said. “That shows Trong is a figure of the party circle with no vision to lead the nation forward but to nowhere.”

Hanoi resident Nguyen Son noted that party leaders never apologize to Vietnamese citizens after they are convicted of wrongdoing.

“The fact that so far the governing party has disrespected the common people is not new,” he told RFA. “They are afraid that if they apologize or take responsibility for the wrongdoing, it would mean that their power has been diminished.

“They never publicly apologize to the people in the media,” he said. “Such a government cannot be said to be of the people, by the people and for the people. It is a government that grasps all power in its hands, so whether they apology or not, nothing can be done about it.”

Lawyer and democracy activist Nguyen Van Dai was even more critical of Trong, who he said should accept more responsibility for the actions of officials in his government.

“I cannot imagine why as a human he can lose all sense of decency,” he said. “The fact that he thinks all wrongdoing by the officials under him does not at all relate to him is unacceptable.”

Dai said their remains a disconnect between the government and the people because under the one-party communist system leaders do not need to face the voters in open elections.

Vietnam ranked in 87th place out of 180 countries on Transparency International’s 2021 Corruption Perception Index, with a higher ranking corresponding to a widespread perception of corruption in the public sector.

Translated by RFA Vietnamese. Written in English by Roseanne Gerin.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA Vietnamese.

Dung’s arrest comes amid a larger investigation into the foreign ministry’s organization of rescue flights for Vietnamese living abroad during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. Several officials are accused of taking bribes from overseas Vietnamese.

The 58-year-old Dung had worked in foreign affairs for nearly 30 years, and was appointed deputy foreign affairs minister in 2019. He was appointed Hanoi’s ambassador to Japan in January but had not yet officially taken the post, Reuters news service reported.

Besides Dung, authorities also arrested Ministry of Health official Pham Trung Kien and former Ministry of Public Security official Vu Anh Tuan Thursday on the same charge.

Four other foreign ministry officials were arrested in January for their alleged roles in the plot.

Translated by An Nguyen. Written in English by Eugene Whong.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA’s Vietnamese Service.

Dung’s arrest comes amid a larger investigation into the foreign ministry’s organization of rescue flights for Vietnamese living abroad during the height of the COVID-19 pandemic. Several officials are accused of taking bribes from overseas Vietnamese.

The 58-year-old Dung had worked in foreign affairs for nearly 30 years, and was appointed deputy foreign affairs minister in 2019. He was appointed Hanoi’s ambassador to Japan in January but had not yet officially taken the post, Reuters news service reported.

Besides Dung, authorities also arrested Ministry of Health official Pham Trung Kien and former Ministry of Public Security official Vu Anh Tuan Thursday on the same charge.

Four other foreign ministry officials were arrested in January for their alleged roles in the plot.

Translated by An Nguyen. Written in English by Eugene Whong.

This content originally appeared on Radio Free Asia and was authored by By RFA’s Vietnamese Service.

Strengthening democracy and rolling back corruption in the Pacific must be front of mind for Pacific leaders meeting with the US Secretary of State today.

Transparency International says the Pacific is facing a number of existential threats, so good governance is critical to open up opportunities for prosperity.

The watchdog group says governments must prioritise anti-corruption efforts by holding leaders accountable, opening up civic space, supporting whistleblowers and clamping down on corrupt businesses.

• READ MORE: Groundbreaking study on Pacific corruption – the full Transparency International report
• Corruption in Pacific big problem – and it’s getting worse, says report

United States Secretary of State Anthony Blinken is meeting Pacific leaders today and Transparency says the US can help by prioritising governance measures in the Pacific in its aid.

Transparency’s 2021 Pacific Global Corruption Barometer found that Pacific people see corruption as a growing problem in government and business.

The region is facing one of the highest bribery rates worldwide in accessing public services.

Two-thirds of those surveyed believe government contracts are secured through bribes and connections and see little control over the dominant extractives sector.

40 percent believe that governments are often run by a few big interests, and over a quarter have been offered a bribe for their votes.

Pacific people believe they can be part of the solution, but feel they are not meaningfully engaged in key decision-making processes.

This article is republished under a community partnership agreement with RNZ.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

The riots in Honiara yesterday, disturbing the city’s normally quiet atmosphere, were unexpected but not surprising.

Someone made reference to a possible protest that would coincide with the convening of Parliament, but details were sketchy and social media was tightlipped about a protest for a change.

Arguably, the riots are a culmination of a number of flashpoints that have been ignored these past few months.

• READ MORE: Solomon Islands PM calls for calm after looting and protests
• Other Solomon Islands riot reports

At a “Tok Stori” Conference jointly held by the Solomon Islands National University and University of Melbourne on Wednesday, 17 November 2021, on the environment, conflict and peace, I spoke about unmasking the faces of those who control the Solomon Islands economy.

I argued that even though 80 percent of land in Solomon Islands is owned by Solomon Islanders, they are largely bystanders, while outsiders, mainly Malaysian, Filipino, and Chinese loggers and mining companies control the resources and the political processes involving our politicians.

People might elect our members of Parliament, but it is the logging companies, mining companies and other largely Asian-owned companies that underwrite the formation of government, influence the election of the Prime Minister, and keep ministers and government supporters under control after the elections.

In return, if they want anything, or need special favours, they go directly to ministers and even the Prime Minister.

Indigenous owners shut out
Indigenous Solomon Island business owners do not have the same access to our leaders. The political governance arrangements in Solomon Islands are shaped by the cozy co-existence between foreign loggers, miners and businesses.

The influence of non-state actors in shaping political undercurrents in Solomon Islands cannot be ignored.

Yesterday’s protest is said to have been instigated by supporters from Malaita, but the frustration with the national government, the attitude of the Prime Minister and ministers to provincial governments and provincial politicians, and the sense of alienation and disenfranchisement, is arguably shared across a wide spectrum of the country.

People feel resentful when they see the national government giving a Malaysian company preferential tax status by virtue of an Act of Parliament, or $13 million as a deposit towards the construction of what are purportedly poor-quality prefabricated houses, while Solomon Islanders have to sleep on the floor in the emergency department of their hospital.

Such things are inevitably bound to fuel resentment. When people see the government bypass local, indigenous contractors for the Pacific Games, it makes them antagonistic, and feel neglected.

This sense of alienation, disempowerment and neglect has been building for some time.

Yesterday’s protest is intertwined with the complexity of the China-Taiwan, and national-provincial government political dynamics that have been well publicised.

Shoddy treatment of Premier
Malaitans in Malaita generally have been sympathetic to their Premier. The shoddy way the national government has been treating their highly respected Premier Daniel Suidani, starting with arrangements for his overseas travel, and then blocking every single attempt he made at appointing ministers while he was away, has not been lost on Malaitans.

The unprecedented welcome he received at Auki when he returned from medical leave was testament to the high regard in which he is held.

Not even the Prime Minister would have come anywhere near size of the crowd that welcomed him that day. Notably absent were the Malaitan members of the national Parliament.

The thousands of supporters who showed up in truckloads from all wards in Malaita to stop the vote of no-confidence against Daniel Suidani should have sent a signal to national parliamentarians and the Prime Minister that it was time to set aside their differences.

Perhaps they underestimated the people’s resolve, thinking that the bribes that were allegedly paid to the Malaita provincial members would have been sufficient to topple Daniel Suidani.

Where the money originated from remains a mystery. However, Daniel Suidani’s vocal opposition to the switch to China, and his courting of Taiwan, might give a clue.

Throughout the past months, there has been little dialogue between the national government and the Malaita provincial government. A great opportunity to avoid today’s protests would have been for government ministers from Malaita to attend a reconciliation ceremony that was held in Aimela, a village outside Auki, last week.

They were not seen. Diplomacy and dialogue are not confined to international relations. They are very important attributes for politicians to have when they deal with each other.

Drifting to self-destruction
Solomon Islands has been drifting to self-destruction. It is one of the most aid dependent countries in the world.

Significant donor support is given to its health and education sector. Yet, its ministers and senior government officials treat its people poorly, and allow them to be exploited by loggers and miners.

Yesterday’s protest and riots are evidence of serious underlying currents that have been neglected. There has to be reform to the political system, including making the government more inclusive.

Those that rioted today probably don’t get anything from government. This has to change, otherwise Solomon Islands could be on the pathway to implosion.

Dr Transform Aqorau is CEO, iTuna Intel and founding director, Pacific Catalyst and a legal adviser to Marshall Islands. He is the former CEO of the Parties to the Nauru Agreement Office. This article was first published on DevPolicy blog at the Australian National University and is republished here under a Creatiuve Commons licence.

A sad day indeed when a school building was also torched and burnt down. My former school, Honiara Senior High School now being burnt down this evening. The science lab is now gone and the fire moving towards the assembly hall. A sad time for the students & teachers not mine pic.twitter.com/MhIa1m8xzU

— Georgina Kekea (@ginakekea) November 24, 2021

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

Of 1000 Fijians surveyed by Transparency International, 11 percent claimed they were asked for sexual favours in exchange for government services or benefits at least once in the past five years.

The survey titled, “Global Corruption Barometer — Pacific Report”, was based on data collected by Tebbutt Research in Fiji between February and March this year.

The report said on the issue of sexual extortion or “sextortion”, sex became the currency of the bribe and people were coerced into engaging in sexual acts in exchange for essential services — including health care and education.

• READ MORE: Corruption in Pacific big problem – and it’s getting worse, says report

Respondents were asked if an official in Fiji made requests of a sexual nature in exchange for a government service or benefits.

However, Fiji’s 11 percent sextortion rate was much lower than other Pacific states, including French Polynesia, which has a 92 percent rate.

“Despite these findings, respondents across the Pacific appear to have difficulty assessing the extent of the problem,” the report read.

“It is worth noting that around a fifth of respondents (17 percent) say that they do not know how often sextortion occurs in their countries.

“It could point to a need for further investigation and community dialogue to better understand and address this heinous form of corruption.”

Survey merely confirms public perception, says Chaudhry

Chaudhry says poll ‘no surprise’
Wanshika Kumar reports that Fiji Labour Party Leader Mahendra Chaudhry said the Transparency International survey merely confirmed a widespread public perception that corruption had become endemic in the country.

Chaudhry said it was no surprise that the poll showed that the majority of the people believed there were high levels of corruption in government and the business sector.

“What else can one expect when the FijiFirst government refuses to enact constitutionally mandated legislation intended to curb corruption in high public office,” Chaudhry said.

“Section 149 of the imposed 2013 Constitution calls for a Code of Conduct for the President, Speaker, Prime Minister and other government ministers, members of Parliament and other high public officeholders.

“Likewise, Section 150 mandates the enactment of a Freedom of Information legislation to give members of the public the right to access official information and government documents.

“Section 121 calls for an independent Accountability and Transparency Commission with the jurisdiction, authority and powers to receive and investigate complaints against all persons holding a public office.

“Yet, in the past eight years, the government has ignored repeated calls to enact these laws to curb corruption in high public office and the business sector.

“What conclusions can be drawn from its failure to do so? If it were genuinely interested in tackling corrupt practices, it would have introduced these measures long ago.”

Lack of accountability
Chaudhry said another reason for high levels of corruption in public office was a worrying lack of accountability and transparency in the government’s handling of public funds.

“Contracts are either awarded without tenders being called or more often than not, are awarded without due disclosure of the details,” he said.

“We have received reports from several companies to say that they have stopped bidding for public tenders because of the lack of transparency in the handling of contracts.”

He said the appointment of executives of large businesses to the boards of government commercial companies or statutory authorities in situations of conflict of interest was also of serious concern.

“Indeed, some big wigs in government are seen to be too close to top guns in the corporate sector,” he said.

“It is no wonder that more than two-thirds of our people believe corruption is high in government circles.”

Anish Chand and Wanshika Kumar are Fiji Times reporters. This report is republished with permission.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

Pacific Islanders believe corruption is a big problem in both their governments and the business sector, says a new report.

About one third of 6000 interviewees across the region believe that most or all members of parliament and staff in heads of government’s offices are involved in corruption, says Transparency International’s Global Corruption Barometer – Pacific 2021.

The survey subjects across 10 countries and territories were asked what they thought about corruption, if they have directly experienced it, and whether things could change.

• READ MORE: Groundbreaking study on Pacific corruption – the full Transparency International report

Transparency International says the result is the most extensive public opinion data on corruption ever gathered in the region.

Corruption was perceived to be worst in Solomon Islands (97 percent) and Papua New Guinea (96 percent), followed closely by the Federated States of Micronesia (80 percent). It is also bad in Vanuatu (73 percent), Fiji (68 percent) and Tonga (62 percent).

Despite more than half of respondents reporting a “fair amount” or a “great deal” of trust in their government to do a good job and treat people fairly, 61 percent believe corruption is a significant problem in their government and 56 percent think it is getting worse.

Impunity also appears to be a problem, with less than a fifth of respondents (18 percent) believing that corrupt officials frequently face appropriate consequences for their actions.

Added to this, only 14 percent believe their government regularly considers them when making decisions.

Bribery common
About one in three paid a bribe

“One of the most significant results was how often ordinary people in the Pacific directly encounter corruption in their daily lives,” says the report.

“Thirty-two percent of interviewees recently paid a bribe to receive public services – a higher rate than any other region surveyed by Transparency International.”

However, rates differ widely by country.

The most common reason given across the region for bribery is to receive a quicker or better public service.

Bribery appears to be a problem across a range of government services, from applying for official government documents to dealing with the police.

Only 13 per cent of those who paid a bribe for a public service reported it. This rises to around 30 percent in Fiji and Kiribati.

‘Sextortion’ also a problem
“Even more worrying is that 38 percent of respondents say they or someone they know have personally experienced ‘sextortion’, where an official requests sexual acts in exchange for an essential government service,” says the report.

About a quarter of respondents have been offered a bribe for their votes. This has serious consequences for the integrity of national and local elections.

In addition, 15 percent of people have received threats of retaliation if they do not vote in a specific way.

It is not only their governments which Pacific Islanders are concerned about. A majority of people interviewed feel that corruption is a big problem in business, too.

“A corruption ‘hotspot’ appears to be government contracts, which more than two thirds of respondents believe businesses secure through bribes and connections,” the report says.

“Almost half of the people we surveyed think there is little control over companies [which] extract natural resources, which is of particular concern given that this is one of the largest industries in the region.”

The good news, says Transparency International, is that “more than 70 percent of respondents say that ordinary people can help to fight corruption”.

“More than 60 percent also think their government is doing a good job at combating corruption”

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.

The arrest of Colombian drug lord Dairo Antonio Úsuga, known as Otoniel, has re-opened deep seated concerns about Tonga’s links with South American drug cartels.

Colombia’s most-wanted drug trafficker “Otoniel” has been captured, officials said at the weekend — a major victory for the government of the world’s top cocaine exporter.

The world is now watching whether Otoniel’s arrest will reduce smuggling of the drugs to Pacific hubs.

• READ MORE: Otoniel: Colombia’s most wanted drug lord captured

Tonga remains a hub for cocaine and methamphetamine distribution, with drugs brought in from Peru, Venezuela and Colombia. The drugs are then transhipped to Australia, New Zealand and China.

Speaker of the House Lord Fakafanua said there was growing evidence that Tonga was a key stopover on international smuggling routes, bringing drugs to Australia and New Zealand.

Tonga vs Columbia
Tonga’s Colombian connection was first exposed in 2011 when Australian police revealed that an international crime syndicate headed by Colombians allegedly bribed a former Speaker of the Tongan Parliament as part of a plot to import tonnes of cocaine into Australia.

The Australian Federal Police (AFP) uncovered a global trafficking operation that allegedly used yachts to sail cocaine from South America to Tonga.

Police alleged that in 2010 the syndicate bribed the then Speaker of the Tongan Legislative Assembly, Lord Tu’ilakepa, who is now Tonga’s Minister of the Ministry of Agriculture, Food, Forests and Fisheries (MAFF), to sponsor a Colombian drug boss to come to the kingdom.

The AFP said the drug boss, Obeil Antonio Zuluaga Gomez, wanted to direct an operating hub from Tonga and oversee cocaine shipments.

In August this year, Tongan police charged more than 20 people after cocaine packages washed up on beaches on Vava’u.

Police seized more than 14 kg of cocaine with an estimated street value of US$2.2 million (TOP$5 million).

RNZ reported that the cocaine packages looked similar to those that were found in Vava’u in 2012 on the wrecked yacht JeReVe.

Vava’u is regarded as a popular destination for yachties. The police believed that the cocaine was anchored there in Vava’u to hide and that locals would find it and bring it onto the land.

The drugs found in Vava’u are believed to have come from Columbia.

His Majesty’s concerns
Drugs have become a major issue in the kingdom, with Tonga’s King criticising Parliament for not doing enough.

In August, Tonga’s Parliament proposed making serious drug offences punishable with death.

The proposal would have applied the death penalty for trafficking more than five kg of Class A drugs or multiple drug offences involving minors.

Tonga retains the death penalty for murder and treason.

Drug smuggling is a problem across the Pacific, with drug seizures in French Polynesia, Fiji and the executive director of the Pacific Islands Chiefs of Police network, Glyn Rowland, said recently the covid-19 pandemic had affected drug routes in the Pacific.

“Certainly, for our young people, unemployment and poverty is a challenge right now because of the pandemic and that makes them quite vulnerable to recruitment into organised crime gangs and facilitating drug movements,” Rowland said.

Republished with permission from Kaniva Tonga.

This content originally appeared on Asia Pacific Report and was authored by APR editor.