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From global efforts to crack down on money laundering to a botched FGM operation in Egypt, check out what our correspondents are reporting on this week
A sneak peek at what’s on our radar this week…
We have dirty cash in our sights this week as we scrutinise global efforts to crack down on money laundering, which the World Bank estimates robs developing countries of up to $40 billion each year.
Our conclusion? A lot of the anti-money laundering regimes in place add up to little more than box-ticking unless backed by the firm hand of enforcement. And such enforcement is often lacking, as data journalist Alex Plough will show in a special multimedia report.
Expect to hear plenty of noise from next week’s G8 summit about “shell companies”, “beneficial ownership” and other slights of hand that make it easy for gangsters, extremists and crooked politicians to magic their loot into prime property or fleets of super cars.
Anti-corruption campaigners are hoping G8 leaders will commit to forcing firms to peel back the onion layers that obscure the ultimate owners of companies, making it harder for criminals to launder their cash through bogus corporate structures in offshore havens. (We’re putting together a snazzy animation that shows you how they do it.)
British Prime Minister David Cameron is leading the transparency charge as chair of the G8. But we’ll take a close look at Britain’s own efforts to investigate and prosecute money laundering offences and ask whether London really is in a position to be lecturing others.
Transparency is a big theme in other ways too. On Tuesday, the European Union parliament will vote on new disclosure requirements for mining, gas and other extractive industries. Stella Dawson will write about why making companies reveal the payments they give to dig precious things from the ground is only the beginning of a broader campaign to hold the powerful to account and lessen corruption.
Luke Balleny will be analysing the future of the Extractive Industry Transparency Initiative, before setting off to Paris for an anti-corruption conference organised by the International Bar Association, where he’ll be exploring, among other things, how public and private sectors can work together to help recover plundered assets.
Watch out for a wealth of stories from our climate change reporters. Three of our journalists – Elias Ntungwe Ngalame, Danstan Kaunda and Madalitso Mwando – swept first, second and third places in the African Climate Change and Environmental Reporting awards last week, underlining why AlertNet Climate has become the go-to place for stories on the human impact of climate change.
Speaking of awards, I’m proud of my New Delhi-based colleague, Nita Bhalla, for winning a prestigious Society of Publishers in Asia award for her human rights reporting. Regular readers will know of her untiring work to shine a light on women’s rights abuses all over South Asia.
This week, Nita will be blogging about a 10-year-old girl she met who was allegedly raped and then locked up in prison when she went to report it. Her story speaks volumes both about police insensitivity – despite the uproar following the Delhi gang rape case – and about the emotional turmoil experienced by young victims (and, indeed, journalists like Nita who interview them).
Emma Batha has two must-read stories in the offing on female genital mutilation (FGM). One will examine the “medicalisation” of FGM in Egypt, where a little girl has recently died from a botched procedure performed by a doctor at a private clinic. The other is a profile of a very unusual campaigner who has succeeded in eliminating the practice from her home region.
Other topics on our agenda include corruption in China, the challenges of delivering aid to Kachin refugees in rebel-controlled areas of Myanmar and why indigenous people in Panama have pulled out of a U.N.-backed programme to protect forests. Stay tuned for these stories and much more.
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