SECOND GLOBAL CIVIL SOCIETY FORUM ON ASSET RECOVERY
Brasilia, 3-5 December 2024
Between 3 and 5 December 2024, representatives of civil society organisations from around the world that are engaged in the recovery of the proceeds of corruption met in Brasília, Brazil, to discuss some of the most pressing barriers, challenges, and opportunities they are facing today.
High on the agenda was the importance of:
- Legal and institutional reform across multiple jurisdictions and at a regional and international level in order to set out the right conditions for effective asset recovery;
- Cooperation between civil society, law enforcement, and other institutions involved in asset recovery, while maintaining the independence of civil society’s voice;
- Effective civil society monitoring of assets that are being returned internationally or disbursed internally to ensure that they reach the victims of corruption and are not re-stolen by the same or other actors. This includes victim participation in mechanisms established to facilitate a return;
- Increased cooperation between CSOs across borders, as well as between CSOs, law enforcement, and other institutions involved in asset recovery across borders, to facilitate the exchange of information and cooperation, and support for that cooperation;
- Engagement around judicial processes, including identifying and using opportunities for CSO participation in court proceedings and the need to expand opportunities for CSO judicial intervention, even in foreign or international jurisdictions;
- Anti-corruption sanctions being an effective tool for promoting accountability that can also support the opening of investigations into the sources of sanctioned assets and potential prosecution and return;
- Explicitly connecting whistleblower protection, asset recovery, beneficial ownership, and victims’ compensation together;
- Victims, who should lie at the heart of any asset recovery process, and the urgency for states to facilitate victim recognition and participation throughout the recovery process as well as to ensure that returned funds are used to benefit the victims of corruption;
- The inclusion of collective victims in discussions around asset recovery and the disbursal of recovered assets and the role of civil society organisations in supporting collective victims;
- Strengthening regional networks and approaches to asset recovery and encouraging more regional groupings to discuss and adopt policy instruments to advance asset recovery in their region or sub-region;
- Addressing methods that corrupt officials are increasingly turning to in order to avoid law enforcement, including using soft power, cultural influence, and educational initiatives to rehabilitate their images;
- Countering politicisation and backlash against asset recovery efforts and protecting those working against grand corruption;
- Better storytelling around the effects of corruption and of asset recovery to humanise the impact of corruption on the lives and livelihoods of ordinary people;
- Ensuring that the role civil society can and should play in all stages of the asset recovery process is effectively entrenched, from investigating potential corruption to advocating for victims’ rights, monitoring returns, and participating in recovery mechanisms.
The representatives of the civil society organisations present agreed to continue to work collectively on these topics and, more broadly, on cases and on global, regional, and national reforms.
| CiFAR – Civil Forum for Asset Recovery, Germany | CIP – Centro de Integridade Publica/Transparency Mozambique | CISLAC – Civil Society Legislative Advocacy Centre/Transparency Nigeria |
| Commission of Equatorial Jurists (CEJ), Equatorial Guinea | CPR – Centrul de Politici și Reforme, Moldova | IPPR – Institute for Public Policy Research, Namibia |
| Poder Ciudadano/Transparency Argentina | Pro Etica/Transparency Peru | Spotlight on Corruption UK |
| TOJIL, Mexico | Transparency International Brazil | Transparency Madagascar |
| Uyele Associação Cívica, Angola |