International Anti-Corruption Day marked in Tashkent

The event was organised jointly by the United Nations Development Programme and the United Nations Office on Drugs and Crime, to recognise the importance of the UN Convention against Corruption as adopted on the 14th of December 2005.

Attended by representatives of UN agencies, international and national partners, and academia, it served to strengthen national partnership for making combating corruption a priority for the 2016-2020 United Nations Development Assistance Framework for Uzbekistan.

No country in the globe is immune to corruption, and everywhere it is a force that undermines social and economic development. On 9 December 2014, UNODC and UNDP conducted a global campaign that drew attention to how corruption has a negative impact on education, health justice, democracy, prosperity and development. Corruption limits the realisation of sustainable development goals, and the protection of essential human rights and freedoms.

To fight corruption on a global scale, the UN Convention against Corruption (UNCAC) entered into force on the 14 December 2005, and as of the 12 November 2014, 173 states are parties to the convention. For these states, which include the Republic of Uzbekistan, the UNCAC has assisted them in adopting legal instruments against corruption, and establishing anti-corruption institutions.

Tuesday’s event served to both congratulate Uzbekistan’s considerable efforts in limiting corruption, and to agree on future areas for continued partnership and development. In Uzbekistan, large-scale work has been carried out within the sphere of introducing anti-corruption measures at different levels of public policy and administration. The creation of constructive dialogue and consultations regarding the prevention of corruption between relevant stakeholders has been on-going initiative, while a new law ‘On openness of activities of state authorities and public institutions’ has been established.

UNDP has provided its own assistance in this regard – it has supported national partners in raising public awareness about the need for legislative, organisational and institutional measures to prevent corruption. To date UNDP has assisted the Government of Uzbekistan in this regard, including by helping increase citizen participation in decision-making, in line with the new corruption law, while increasing the quality of rule-making processes.

Discussions between UNDP and its partners on the 9th of December underlined the need for the development and support of pilot corruption prevention measures that will help create an anti-corruption policy, and strengthening citizen trust in state authorities by making their activities transparent and reducing corruption risks. It also discussed the possibility of international expertise being offered to develop national programmes for corruption prevention.

Other areas of discussion related to the enhancement of legislation for the civil service system, the promotion of merit-based competitive recruitment, appointment and promotion, and the strengthening of a Code of Conduct for Public Officials accordingly. The use of international knowledge and case studies in strengthening national legislation regarding public procurement and local budgets, and for making public policy more accountable and transparent, were other topics on the table.

It was intended that Tuesday’s event would further strengthen partnerships between those stakeholders involved, key representatives of whom included Deputy Prosecutor of the Republic of Uzbekistan Mr. Sherzod Matiev, and UN Resident Coordinator in Uzbekistan Mr. Stefan Priesner. The event’s 50 participants also included representatives of the Office of the Prosecutor General, the Ministry of Internal Affairs, the Ministry of Justice, and the Academy of Public Administration under the President of the Republic of Uzbekistan. Representatives of UNDP, UNODC, OSCE, the World Bank and national NGOs, the Ombudsperson, and members of higher academia, were also present.