Russian chief prosecutor reports successes, failures in combating corruption

(Interfax – November 27, 2013) Some 3,600 corrupt officials at various levels were convicted in Russia in the first nine months of the year, Prosecutor-General Yuriy Chayka said on 27 November, as quoted by privately-owned Russian news agency Interfax.

“The stereotype that high-ranking officials are untouchable is being destroyed,” Chayka said, speaking at a coordination meeting of heads of Russian law-enforcement bodies. He also said that the number of people acquitted of corruption-related crimes had “decreased by nearly one-third”, and that nearly 60,000 officials had been disciplined or had administrative action taken against them as a result of checks by prosecutors in the first nine months of 2013.

Speaking of shortcomings and failings in combating corruption, Chayka said that, while the number of proven instances of bribe-taking continued to decrease, more bribe-givers were being prosecuted in order to inflate figures. He also criticized law-enforcement bodies for focusing on petty crimes, such as illegal payments received by teachers or medics, for spending resources on old crimes covered by the statute of limitations.

A later Interfax report quoted Chayka also criticizing bailiffs for failing to enforce large fines ordered by courts for those guilty of bribery, saying that their actions undermined “the inevitability of punishment for corruption”.

The problem of repaying the losses sustained as a result of corruption persists, Chayka said: “In completed criminal cases, the losses repaid in the course of the investigation amount to under 10 per cent, or R2bn [about 66m dollars] out of R21bn.” He also complained that the courts often failed to order the confiscation of corrupt officials’ assets when appropriate: only 200 people have had their assets confiscated in 2013, Chayka said.

Criticizing the work of investigation bodies, Chayka said that prosecutors had to revoke more than 7,000 unlawful refusals to institute criminal proceedings over corruption, and were instrumental in the resumption of investigation in over 1,200 corruption-related cases that had been stopped or suspended. The report did not specify what period the figures covered.

According to state-owned news agency RIA Novosti, Chayka also criticized law-enforcers’ own internal security for “not always acting efficiently” against “more than isolated cases of corruption” in law enforcement. He said police internal security subunits had checked 5,000 complaints of corruption this year but only 129 staff had been prosecuted as a result.