2020 Corruption Perceptions

 Global highlights  

The 2020 edition of the CPI ranks 180 countries and territories by their perceived levels of public sector corruption, drawing on 13 expert assessments and surveys of business executives. It uses a scale of zero (highly corrupt) to 100 (very clean). 

Denmark and New Zealand top the index, with 88 points. Syria, Somalia and South Sudan come last, with 14, 12 and 12 points, respectively.  

Significant changes 

Since 2012, the earliest point of comparison in the current CPI methodology, 26 countries significantly improved their CPI scores, including Ecuador (39), Greece (50), Guyana (41), Myanmar (28) and South Korea (61).   

Twenty-two countries significantly decreased their scores, including Bosnia  & Herzegovina (35), Guatemala (25), Lebanon (25), Malawi (30), Malta (53) and Poland (56). 

Nearly half of countries have been stagnant on the index for almost a decade, indicating stalled government efforts to tackle the root causes of corruption. More than two-thirds score below 50. 

COVID-19 

Corruption poses a critical threat to citizens’ lives and livelihoods, especially when combined with a public health emergency. Clean public sectors correlate with greater investment in health care. Uruguay, for example, has the highest CPI score in Latin America (71), invests heavily in health care and has a robust epidemiological surveillance system, which has aided its response to COVID-19 and other infectious diseases, like yellow fever and Zika.  

In contrast, Bangladesh scores just 26 and invests little in health care while corruption flourishes during COVID-19, ranging from bribery in health clinics to misappropriated aid. Corruption is also pervasive in the procurement of medical supplies. Countries with higher corruption levels also tend to be the worst violators of rule of law and democratic institutions during the COVID-19 crisis. These include Philippines (34), where the response to COVID-19 has been characterised by major attacks on human rights and media freedom.  

Continuing a downward trend, the United States achieves its worst score since 2012, with 67 points. In addition to alleged conflicts of interest and abuse of office at the highest level, in 2020 weak oversight of the US$1 trillion COVID-19 relief package raised serious concerns and marked a retreat from longstanding democratic norms promoting accountable government. 

Recommendations 

The past year highlighted integrity challenges among even the highest-scoring countries, proving that no country is free of corruption. To reduce corruption and better respond to future crises, Transparency International recommends that all governments: 

Strengthen oversight institutions to ensure resources reach those most in need. Anti-corruption authorities and oversight institutions must have sufficient funds, resources and independence to perform their duties. 

Ensure open and transparent contracting to combat wrongdoing, identify conflicts of interest and ensure fair pricing. 

Defend democracy and promote civic space to create the enabling conditions to hold governments accountable. 

Publish relevant data and guarantee access to information to ensure the public receives easy, accessible, timely and meaningful information. 

Check the link:

https://news.cision.com/transparency-international/r/2020-corruption-perceptions-index-reveals-widespread-corruption-is-weakening-covid-19-response--thre,c3275364

RUSSIA EXPANDS UNIT INTEGRATION WITH BELARUSIAN AND SERBIAN MILITARIES

 According to ISW, the joint Russian-Belarusian-Serbian military exercise Slavic Brotherhood 2021 advanced Russian efforts to gain control over the Belarusian military and cultivate partner forces that the Kremlin can use in future Russian deployments. 

President Lukashenko promoted pro-Kremlin task force to maintain in power and militarize the political assetments and gain geopolitical position. The political strategy is about use task forces over the territory and keep the politics siege by EU. 

Military exercises is a deterrent strategy in EU paralel to NATO forces, than keep the Kremlin forçes opperating together Belarusian and Serbian allies.

Russia and Belarus operated integrated combat units at the company level for the first time, building on previous exercises fielding combined battalions. The Kremlin practiced integrating non-Belarusian troops into Russian-controlled companies and platoons for the first time—a dangerous development that will expand Russian control over the militaries of sovereign states, enhance Russian force generation capabilities, and help the Kremlin obfuscate its military activity by framing Russian activities as multilateral. The Kremlin will develop these capabilities further in future exercises, including the upcoming annual capstone strategic readiness exercise, Zapad 2021, in September. 

The Kremlin’s increasing capability to create integrated units with Belarus is likely intended to support a permanent Russian presence in Belarus.

The Kremlin may also be preparing Russian forces to subsume elements of Belarusian combat units in the event of a Russian intervention against the will of the Belarusian government—an unlikely but dangerous course of action ISW has previously warned of.

Use of hybrid strategy and paramilitary forces of PMCs and militias, promoted the assymetric conflicts in territory. Slavic Brotherhood be a good armed militia to support the Eurasian forces, the advance of Brotherhood over EU territory is a treat on anti-Kremlin forces, which supposed to act as NATO militias inside the terrotiry.

The Kremlin used Slavic Brotherhood 2021 to prepare for Russia’s upcoming annual capstone strategic readiness exercise, Zapad 2021. The Russian military’s primary stated objective for Slavic Brotherhood 2021 was to improve cohesion between the staff headquarters and combat units of participating states—a focus likely intended to support joint operations between Russian and Belarusian command staffs in Zapad 2021. Slavic Brotherhood 2021 participants additionally conducted tactical tasks that Russian and Belarusian Zapad 2021 participants will likely repeat. Russia and Belarus will likely intensify their unit and headquarters integration efforts in the buildup to Zapad, which will occur in September 2021.

http://www.understandingwar.org/backgrounder/belarus-warning-update-russia-expands-unit-integration-belarusian-and-serbian