February 2026
The last few years have seen a waning in the previous acceleration in the use of anti-corruption sanctions across all sanctioning jurisdictions, with relatively small changes to sanctions lists – both in terms of additions and removals.
Larger changes however took place this year. The UK in April 2025 added 12 new people to its Global Anti-Corruption Sanctions and Switzerland in January 2026 designated 37 Venezuelans under its Foreign Illicit Assets Act.
UK designations
In April 2021, the United Kingdom adopted the Global Anti-Corruption Sanctions Regulations allowing it to sanction people implicated in serious cases of corruption. The sanctions impose asset freezes and travel bans for individuals, companies, or organisations believed to have been involved in serious corruption with regards to bribery and the misappropriation of funds (through supporting, concealing, benefitting from, or failing to properly investigate serious corruption). In 2020, the UK adopted a separate global human rights sanctions regime focused on human rights violations.
In April 2025, 12 new individuals were added to the UK’s Global Anti-Corruption Sanctions list from three countries: Georgia, Guatemala and Moldova.
- Additions from Georgia included two individuals suspected of using their positions in the judicial system to the advantage of one particular political party
- Additions from Guatemala were largely linked to former President Alejandro Eduardo Giamattei Falla. These sanctions relate to allegations that several high ranking officials received appointments in exchange for ignoring or actively undermining investigations into corruption
- Persons added from Moldova are suspected of being proxies for further sanctioned persons.
Swiss designations
A special administrative legal regime allows the Swiss government to apply asset freezing orders via the Foreign Illicit Assets Act (FIAA) in cases involving politically exposed persons (PEPs) very quickly. Its purpose is to facilitate freezing, confiscation and restitution of assets held by foreign PEPs or their close associates which have lost power in the country of origin, and where there is reason to assume that those assets were misappropriated. This should give time the new authorities to file requests for mutual legal assistance aiming at recovering the funds.
Following the removal of Maduro from Venezuela to the US by US special forces in January 2026, the Swiss Federal Council issued an order to freeze any assets related to Maduro and 36 other Venezuelans present within Switzerland’s jurisdiction. They emphasized that this was a precautionary measure, to prevent any possible outflows of capital while at the same time calling for respect for international law.
Table: Changes in individual listings in key anti-corruption sanctions regimes in the previous 12 months, as of February 2026
| Regime | Removals | Additions | Total corruption designations |
| US Global Magnitsky Human Rights Accountability Act | 0 | 0 | 125 |
| UK Global Anti-Corruption Sanctions Regulations | 1 | 12 | 64 |
| EU misappropriation sanctions Tunisia | 0 | 0 | 30 |
| EU misappropriation sanctions Ukraine | 0 | 0 | 3 |
| Canadian Freezing Assets of Corrupt Foreign Officials Act | 0 | 0 | 25 |
| Canadian Justice for Victims of Corrupt Foreign Officials Act | 0 | 3 | 55 |
| Swiss Foreign Illicit Assets Act | 0 | 37 | 0 |
| Total | 1 | 51 | 302 |
Sanctions Watch
Sanctions Watch, a one-of-a-kind resource on anti-corruption sanctions, tracks individuals sanctioned in response to serious corruption allegations under key anti-corruption regimes worldwide, including Canada, the European Union, Switzerland, UK, and United States.
Sanctions Watch allows people to search for and find information on individuals sanctioned for corruption by name, country, as well as sanction regime. Besides profiles of each sanctioned individual, the platform also offers analysis and resources about each anti-corruption sanctions regime, as well as compliance guidelines for the private sector, and our research in different countries about anti-corruption sanctions.
CiFAR updates the website and database on which it is based every six months. To see the individuals sanctioned for their alleged involvement in corruption or to download the complete database, please visit https://sanctionswatch.cifar.eu/