Connect with us

General

Calls to axe secret police counter-corruption guidance on links with journalists

Published

on

[ad_1]

Calls have been made to scrap secret police guidance which appears to treat journalists akin to criminals and extremists.

The Society of Editors and the Crime Reporters Association (CRA) have warned the hidden section of the College of Policing’s guidance risks “equating the media profession with the wrong-doing and corruption journalists sought to uncover”.

In a letter to Andy Marsh, chief executive of the body which sets police standards and training, the Society’s executive director Dawn Alford and chairwoman of the CRA Rebecca Camber said the counter-corruption guidance risks “damaging the public’s perception of the media” and requires “urgent revision”.

The Authorised Professional Practice (APP) guidance is issued to all police forces in England and Wales.

Although parts of it are published online, the section on “notifiable associations”, a list of links with people and groups that officers should declare associations with, is restricted and therefore not open to public scrutiny.

The letter said: “The media fulfils a vital role in keeping the public informed about the work of the police and alongside bringing offenders to justice and helping keep communities safe, media scrutiny promotes transparency and aids understanding of how police forces across the UK operate.

“The inclusion of journalists within a ‘notifiable associations’ list in counter-corruption guidance gives the wrongful impression that reporters seek to corrupt or deceive and equates the profession with the wrongdoing and dishonesty that journalists work to uncover.”

It comes after the Metropolitan Police Service (MPS) was criticised by the police watchdog for not requiring officers to disclose associations with journalists in line with the national guidance.

Earlier this year Her Majesty’s Inspectorate of Constabulary and Fire & Rescue Services (HMICFRS) apologised in the wake of objections from media bodies after appearing to equate journalists with extremist groups in findings on corruption in the Met. Its report recommended police officers disclose associations with “journalists and extremist groups”.

Despite the apology, the recommendation remained unchanged and its implementation is thought to be currently under review, industry leaders said, warning that any decision by the Met to adopt this “would set a disturbing precedent.”

The letter said: “At a time when a number of our members continue to report difficulties in accessing information on behalf of the public from individual forces, the implementation of the HMICFRS recommendation by the MPS would set a disturbing precedent for other forces to follow at a time when police and media relationships across a number of forces remains low.

“A successful working relationship between the police service and journalists is vital to policing legitimacy in the UK and as the new Commissioner Sir Mark Rowley prepares to take office and seeks to improve public confidence in the force, the public’s perception of the police’s relationship with the media is just as important as the relationship itself.

“By continuing to force police officers and staff to list associations with journalists under the banner of counter-corruption efforts, the policy merely continues to associate both with the wrongdoing all seek to distance themselves from.

“It is in the interests of all for the police and media to work effectively to the benefit of the public and it is our belief that the removal of journalists from the declarable associations list of the authorised professional practice guidance for counter corruption would help achieve this.”

Freedom of expression campaign group Index on Censorship’s chief executive Ruth Smeeth said: “Index is increasingly concerned at the seemingly growing perception within the British police that journalists are seen as unsavoury or potentially disreputable individuals for officers to associate with.

“Freedom of the media is a bedrock of our democracy and the tendency to see reporters as a threat rather than an asset is something we are more used to seeing with our work in authoritarian regimes around the world rather than advanced democracies.”

Steve Hartshorn, national chairman of the Police Federation of England and Wales (PFEW), said: “PFEW is not aware of forces obligating individual officers to disclose associations with journalists as part of the APP guidance.

“We believe that there is an ardent need for all forces to work in cooperation with journalists, who are governed by a code of conduct and guidance of the Independent Press Standard Organisation, to promote the good work our members do every day and to explain policing issues needed for ensuring public confidence in our police officers.

“The APP guidance should be followed by forces in its intended spirit.”

An HMICFRS spokeswoman said: “We acknowledge the essential role journalists play in our democracy, including holding police forces to account.

“We make recommendations for police forces, taking into account relevant authorised professional practice where appropriate.”

A College of Policing spokesman said: “Journalists have an important role in holding police to account and supporting the service with news stories including appeals for information.

“There is a public expectation for the police to have policies in place to protect sensitive information held by the police which can include details of members of the public and police operations.

“This includes a requirement to declare any potential conflicts of interest in order to be open and transparent, as well as mitigate any risks that may arise.

“The guidance given to police forces should not impede healthy relationships between the police and the media. We are working with the National Police Chiefs’ Council and others to review the guidance and will listen very carefully to any issues raised by the media.”



[ad_2]

Source link

Continue Reading
Click to comment

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *

General

Vietnam dismisses two deputy PMs amid corruption probes

Published

on

By

[ad_1]

HANOI – Vietnam dismissed two deputy prime ministers amid lengthy investigations driven by a campaign to clean up corruption and protect the Communist Party’s legitimacy.

The National Assembly voted to dismiss Deputy Prime Minister Vu Duc Dam from office during a four-day special session that began on Thursday. Mr Pham Binh Minh, who has held the position since late 2013, was also voted out.

The Parliament did not provide reasons for the dismissals. Prime Minister Pham Minh Chinh earlier on Thursday asked the National Assembly to dismiss Mr Dam and Mr Minh at their requests, VnExpress news website reported.

Of the 484 delegates who voted, 476 approved the dismissals and three did not vote, according to a tally provided by the National Assembly.

Delegates also voted to approve Minister of Natural Resources and Environment Tran Hong Ha, 59, and head of the Haiphong provincial Communist Party Tran Luu Quang, 55, to replace Mr Dam and Mr Minh.

Party officials in September stepped up efforts to prod officials to resign if they have been reprimanded, disciplined and are deemed to have low competency. Party Chief Nguyen Phu Trong has also urged timely dismissals of officials who have not been effective in their roles or have committed wrongdoings.

The dismissals come as the authorities aggressively tackle graft as part of a years-long campaign that has ensnared hundreds of officials and businessmen. The probes have defined Mr Trong’s legacy as he serves a rare third five-year term.

There were signs that this was coming for the two top-ranking officials. Late in December, the two were dismissed from the powerful party Central Committee. Mr Minh, a former foreign minister, was also dismissed from the Politburo, which plays a leading role in the country’s governance. The dismissals came at their requests, Thanh Nien newspaper reported earlier. 

Police recently detained Mr Dam’s assistant on alleged abuse of power amid investigations involving Viet A Technology JSC, a maker of Covid-19 test kits. The authorities in September also detained Nguyen Quang Linh, an assistant of Mr Minh’s, and Nguyen Thanh Hai, director of the department of international relations under the government’s coordinating office, for alleged bribery tied to the organisation of repatriation flights for Vietnamese abroad during the pandemic. The authorities have begun criminal proceedings against 39 individuals tied to the case.

Criminal proceedings have been initiated against 102 individuals tied to the Viet A Technology case. In June, police detained former health minister Nguyen Thanh Long, former Hanoi mayor Chu Ngoc Anh, and a former deputy minister of science and technology for alleged ties to bribery and abuse of power in investigations involving the test kit maker.

Mr Trong has warned that corruption could put the party’s legitimacy at risk as the public grows more intolerant of graft – echoing President Xi Jinping in neighbouring China. In one of the biggest cases to date, former Vietnam politburo member Dinh La Thang was sentenced in 2018 to 18 years in prison for violating state regulations.

Vietnam, a country of roughly 100 million people, also has much to gain economically if it can bolster its image as place to do business. 

During a corruption standing committee meeting on Nov 18, Mr Trong pointed to slow progress in handling some major graft cases and called for stronger actions to be taken, according to his speech posted on the government’s website.  

In 2022, the authorities initiated criminal investigations of 4,646 individuals in 2,474 cases for alleged violations tied to corruption, abuse of power and economic wrongdoings. Since early 2021, the Politburo and the party have disciplined 67 officials under the management of the Politburo and the Secretariat, including five ministers and former ministers, 13 provincial chairmen and former chairmen and 20 lower-level officers.

In April, police detained Deputy Foreign Affairs Minister To Anh Dung over alleged bribery while he organised repatriation flights for Vietnamese abroad during the pandemic. BLOOMBERG

[ad_2]

Source link

Continue Reading

General

Digging into Honeywell UOP’s Bribery Schemes in Brazil and Algeria (Part II of III)

Published

on

By

[ad_1]

The facts surrounding Honeywell’s bribery schemes in Brazil and Algeria are fairly straightforward.  In Brazil, the facts underscore the significant risks of bribery when companies participate in large, valuable project competitions.  Global companies face significant risks when competing and seek every advantage to win a project competition.

Brazil

In 2008 and 2009, Petrobras developed the Premium Refinery project to design and construct two grassroots refineries to process heavy oil in Maranhão and Cerá, Brazil. The project had three bidding phases: technical ranking, design competition and commercial valuation.  Honeywell was interested in the project as an important foothold in the Brazil oil industry.

In July 2009, Petrobras invited Honeywell UOP and a number of competitors to participate in the first phase.  The companies submitted technical proposals for the project.  UOP and two other companies received the highest technical scores and all three companies were permitted to participate in the second phase.

In April 2010, Honeywell searched for a sales intermediary to assist in the Premium project bid.  Honeywell executives believed they needed higher-level contacts at Petrobras to win the contract.   Honeywell’s account manager recommended a Brazil agent because the agent stated he had access to Petrobras’s downstream director responsible for the Premium project.

Honeywell officials submitted an internal request for approval to retain the agent and specifically represented that the agent would receive a 3 percent commission (or $12 million) if successful.  The request falsely represented that the Honeywell officials knew the agent for two years and omitted the fact the agent would interact with Petrobras officials.

In May and August 2010, the agent and Honeywell’s Petrobras account manager met with a Brazilian lobbyist with close ties to Petrobras’s downstream director.  Honeywell’s account manager offered the Brazilian lobbyist and Petrobras’s downstream director a portion of the sales commission (3 percent) in exchange for helping Honeywell win the Premium contract.

In a subsequent meeting, Honeywell’s account manager met with the Petrobras downstream director and the lobbyist at a shopping mall in Rio de Janeiro and they agreed that the Petrobras director would assist Honeywell win the contract in exchange for a percentage of the commission.

Honeywell secured the lead in the design context and the bidders prepared to submit their commercial proposals.  Honeywell’s account manager updated his supervisors on meetings he conducted with the Petrobras director, the lobbyist and the sales agent in which he and the agent sought information on what to bid to win the commercial phase.  The Honeywell account manager and his supervisors referred to Petrobras’s director as the “King” and the lobbyist as the “King’s assistant.”

Honeywell submitted a commercial bid of $425 million.  A Petrobras lower level official rejected the bid as too high. Honeywell sought to get the “King” to intervene and get the “decisions up to his level in order to control.”  Inb August 2010 Honeywell’s regional director pressured his supervisors to execute the sales agent agreement stating, “I want to get this back to [the sales agent] as soon as possible, because we are pushing the king to step up and intercede.”  That same day, Honeywell submitted a revised commercial bid of $348 million to Petrobras based on specific guidance provided by the Petrobras director.  Petrobras accepted the bid and Honeywell won the contract.

Honeywell paid the sales agent a total of $10.4 million in commissions from a U.S. bank account.  The payments were made without receipt of an invoice from the sale agent.  The payment requests lacked basic relevant information.  Later, the sales agent wanted his commission payments routed to a Swiss bank account in a different name associated with the sales agent’s new company.

Algeria

In November 2004, Honeywell Belgium contracted with Sonatrach, Algeria’s state-owned oil company to modernize the instrumentation and control systems at a refinery in Oran, Algeria.  In 2008, Honeywell renegotiated the contract.  One year later, Honeywell and Sonatrach had a dispute concerning the contract and all work ceased on the project. Sonatrach believed that Honeywell Belgium should pay liquidated damages for the delay. Sonatrach’s downstream director was a key decision maker in the resolution of the dispute.

Starting in 2010, Honeywell Belgium retained a Monaco sales agent, who was subjected to due diligence review and approved.  Honeywell used the sales agent to help resolve the liquidated damages dispute.  Honeywell then used the sales agent to pass through various payments to a group of people who helped Honeywell secure a contract with Sonatrach.  The Monaco sales agent understood this to mean the payment as possibly a bribe.

Later, in 2011, a Honeywell sales manager engaged a consultant to help resolve the problems Honeywell was having with Sonatrach.  The consultant made two separate payments to the Sonatrach official, $50,000 and $25,000, respectively, from a Swiss bank account.

Sonatrach and Honeywell Belgium continued to disagree about the contract in Algeria.  Sonatrach threatened to transfer the contract to another company.  After making the first $50,000 payment to the Sonatrach official, Honeywell and Sonatrach agreed to modify the contract and resolve their dispute.

Two weeks later, the Monaco sales agent and a Honeywell subsidiary entered into a fictitious sales consultancy agreement where the agent would purportedly promote sales in Algeria for a 2 to 4.5 percent commission (capped at $500,000 per year).  Despite not achieving any of the contractual milestones, the Monaco sales agent was paid $300,000.

The Monaco sales agent was paid to reimburse the consultant who made the two bribery payments to the Sonatrach director.  The Monaco sales agent sent an invoice to Honeywell for a lump sum fee of $300,000 relating to the refinery project. Honeywell approved the invoice payment.  The sales agent, in turn, repaid the consultant the $75,000 through a series of intermediary transfers involving multiple U.S. correspondent banks located in New York.

[ad_2]

Source link

Continue Reading

General

Republicans Fume Over Cost of a Speakerless House

Published

on

By

[ad_1]

GOP wants to investigate Hunter Biden, Mayorkas, and the IRS. First they have to agree on a speaker.

Getty Images

• January 4, 2023 6:00 pm

Subpoenaing Hunter Biden, impeaching Department of Homeland Security secretary Alejandro Mayorkas, and stopping President Joe Biden’s plan to hire thousands of IRS agents. These big ticket items were supposed to be priorities in the House agenda, but after taking power following two years of full Democratic control of the government, Republicans’ plans could be delayed for weeks, months, or indefinitely, as the party fails to find a speaker of the House.

The chaos in the Capitol is stirring ire among House Republicans, the vast majority of whom support Rep. Kevin McCarthy (R., Calif.) for the role. Republican members who spoke with the Washington Free Beacon said they were powerless to do just about anything, such as fulfilling basic constituent services or setting staff up with emails. 

“If we had elected Kevin McCarthy speaker we would have already voted to defund the 87,000 new IRS agents, new border security measures, and a select committee on China,” Rep. Michael Waltz (R., Fla.) told the Free Beacon. “We would also be sending notices to the Biden administration that we’re coming for answers on the FBI, Department of Justice, the Afghanistan withdrawal, and conflicts of interest surrounding the Biden family.”

Without a House speaker, the legislative body grinds to a halt. No members can be sworn in, introduce legislation, or issue subpoenas. For all intents and purposes, the United States currently doesn’t have a House of Representatives. But the failure to find a House speaker carries political consequences as well. The longer the fight drags on, the longer Biden, who is expected to run for reelection in 2024, goes without virtually any real oversight in the form of hearings and subpoenas. 

Congress has proven itself effective at inflicting damage on a president or future candidate, as evidenced by investigations into Hillary Clinton and former president Donald Trump. Clinton faced over a year of scrutiny from House Republicans for her role in the Benghazi attacks as secretary of state and her use of a private email server to conduct professional business, which only ended after she lost her second bid for president in 2016. Democrats spent nearly four years investigating Trump over every facet of his administration, resulting in two impeachments and a failed reelection campaign.

Democrats, who told voters on the campaign trail that a Republican majority would mean few bills would get passed as they investigate Hunter Biden, and Republicans agree that oversight would be a chief priority in the new Congress. One senior staffer close to the Republican Oversight Committee said members had a day-by-day plan on various Biden administration officials they planned to subpoena. That project, which was to be publicly announced on Tuesday, is now on hold.

“The people who are voting against Kevin McCarthy in the Republican conference are aiding Joe Biden, aiding [House Minority Leader] Hakeem Jeffries, and aiding [Senate Majority Leader] Chuck Schumer. Because they are the reason we are not getting about the business we set out to do,” said Rep. Mike Lawler (R., N.Y.) on Fox News on Wednesday. “When it comes to Jim Jordan’s oversight on [the Judiciary Committee], guess what? Can’t do it, because of these folks. When it comes to securing our border, guess what? Can’t do it, because of these folks. When it comes to reining in wasteful spending under the Biden administration, guess what? Can’t do it, because of these folks.”

The Republican Party’s inability to find a speaker does not look like it will be resolved any time soon. One individual close to the negotiations, who identifies as a neutral party and spoke on the condition of anonymity, said the anti-McCarthy voting bloc’s demands are untenable.

“What [Rep. Matt] Gaetz is asking for isn’t really possible if you want a functioning House,” the individual said. “McCarthy has to give everything away to make these people happy.”

The anti-McCarthy group of Republicans has made a number of demands, some publicly and others in backroom negotiations. Those demands include a vote on a number of bills including a balanced budget amendment and term limits. Rule change demands include requiring a two-thirds majority vote for all earmarks, committee spots, and a pledge from the Congressional Leadership Fund, a Republican super PAC, not to meddle in primaries.



[ad_2]

Source link

Continue Reading

Trending

Copyright © 2021 CorruptionByLawEnforcement.com