OECD URGES ARMENIA TO CRACK DOWN ON TRADITION OF BRIBERY

Agence France Presse — English
December 18, 2006 Monday 11:29 AM GMT

The Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development urged
Armenia to crack down on a "tradition of bribe-giving" in a report
on Monday which passed severe judgement on the handling of corruption.

The OECD said: "To tackle the pervasive tradition of bribe-giving
in Armenia, the leadership of the country needs to lead and support
anti-corruption efforts through a combination of law enforcement,
further legal reform and public education campaigns."

Armenia had taken several steps to improve action against corruption,
the OPECD said, but "the number of convictions for corruption is low,
especially for high-ranking officials, and more efforts must be made
to investigate allegations and bring cases to court".

Agencies responsible for enforcing the law and for controlling
financial activities had to improve their co-operation and measures
were needed to "cut abuse of the system for declaring gifts and assets
by public officials".

However, the report, by the OECD anti-corruption network for Eastern
Europe and Central Asia, said that since 2004 Armenia had taken steps
to improve its criminal laws, adopting a broad definition of who was
a public official and making bribery a criminal act.

Controls on money laudering had been strengthened.

Procedures for the award of public-sector contracts had been improved.

"However, many of the above measures are only initial steps in the
right direction and much remains to be done to ensure integrity in
the civil service and to reduce the burden of corruption in various
spheres of public and business life."