13th International Anti-Corruption Conference

The 13th biennial International Anti-corruption Conference, which attracted some 1,300 officials and academics from more than 135 countries to share their views in the fight against corruption, was held in Athens from October 30 to November 2, 2008.

Under the banner “Global Transparency: Fighting corruption for a sustainable future”, the conference gave special attention to the challenge corruption poses to sustainable and equitable development. Leading practitioners and experts on sustainability, governance, and transparency met to discuss the role of corruption and governance in the crucial questions that will "make or break a sustainable future".

Mary Robinson participated in the second plenary session of the conference: Corruption in Natural Resources & Energy Markets.

The discussion, which concentrated on Africa’s extractive industries sector, also included the participation of Patrick Alley, Director and co-founder of Global Witness, Ngozi Okonjo-Iweala, Managing Director ofthe World Bank; Peter Eigen, Chair of the Extractive Industries Transparency Initiative and Karin Lissakers, Executive Director of the Revenue Watch Institute.

Patrick Alley illustrated the brutal inequality that is the dark side of natural resource extraction: mansions; million-dollar-motorcars; and international institutions assisting in the laundering of looted assets. So serious is the offence, he suggested, that corruption should perhaps even be considered a crime against humanity.

This point was echoed by Mary Robinson, who reinforced that the anti-corruption and human rights agendas are increasingly interlinked and interdependent. The message was clear from both: businesses must take a more pro-active approach to human rights – to ‘do no harm’ is no longer enough.

The IACC is the premier forum to engage in innovative and open debates about corruption challenges for our future. Representatives of civil society, government and business from around the world engage in spirited and frank debates to find effective solutions for tackling corruption and limit its pervasive impact on peoples’ lives, particularly on the most vulnerable.