In June, we joined civil society organisations and other stakeholders in Geneva at the Office of the High Commissioner for Human Rights’ (OHCHR) expert meeting on strengthening international cooperation for the repatriation of funds of illicit origin and their use for the realization of human rights. We left that discussion with a clear message: asset recovery is not only about where stolen money goes, but also about who has been harmed and who gets a say in what happens next.
How and why did CiFAR start and what are some of the challenges and opportunities CiFAR faces going into the next decade?
Reflections from the OHCHR expert meeting
CiFAR is officially 10 years old today! Ten years ago, on the 25 May we completed our registration as a charitable association in Germany and could officially commence operations.
How can civil society, law enforcement and public oversight bodies collaborate for effective prevention of illicit financial flows and the recovery of stolen assets? This was the topic of discussions we had this week in Nairobi, Kenya.
In early 2026, CiFAR launched a new project - Empowering Civil Society for Transparent and Inclusive Asset Recovery in West Africa. During two planning workshops in the Gambia and in Benin, we went through some of the main asset recovery cases across the continent, explored good practices for civil society engagement and planned activities for the coming months.
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.
In December 2025, the UNCAC Conference of States Parties (CoSP) met in Doha to discuss the latest developments in anti-corruption at the global level and to agree new resolutions to advance and detail the provisions of the United Nations Convention Against Corruption.
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