In early 2026, CiFAR launched a new project - Empowering Civil Society for Transparent and Inclusive Asset Recovery in West Africa. During two planning workshops in the Gambia and in Benin, we went through some of the main asset recovery cases across the continent, explored good practices for civil society engagement and planned activities for the coming months.
The last few years have seen a waning in the previous acceleration in the use of anti-corruption sanctions across all sanctioning jurisdictions, with relatively small changes to sanctions lists – both in terms of additions and removals. Larger changes however took place this year. The UK in April 2025 added 12 new people to its Global Anti-Corruption Sanctions and Switzerland in January 2026 designated 37 Venezuelans under its Foreign Illicit Assets Act.
In December 2025, the UNCAC Conference of States Parties (CoSP) met in Doha to discuss the latest developments in anti-corruption at the global level and to agree new resolutions to advance and detail the provisions of the United Nations Convention Against Corruption.
Efforts to recover and return stolen assets are gaining momentum worldwide—but ensuring that returned assets are used transparently and for the public benefit remains a critical challenge. Civil society organisations are increasingly recognised as key actors in monitoring asset return processes, strengthening accountability, mitigating corruption risks, and building public trust.
As COSP 11 comes to a close in Doha, its clear that the fragmented and challenging international environment is continuing to make it hard for States committed to fighting corruption through accountable, transparent and participatory methods to make meaningful headway.
In this blog post, we dive into how the real estate ecosystem operates for different kinds of transactions, looking at the different actors who could or should be involved in different types of property or land sales and the ways in which the ecosystem should act to prevent money laundering. The purpose here is not to identify explicitly where failings could be happening – rather it is to set out process, to assist interested parties to understand how actors interact with each other.
Last week we attended the Asset Recovery Working Group meeting in Vienna, that took place between the 3-5 September. In this blog we wanted to highlight what the meeting does, why its important for civil society to attend and what we wanted to, and were able to, achieve there.
Between 16-17 June 2025, CiFAR attended the conference on Asset Recovery and Compensation to Victims in Maputo, Mozambique, organised by CIP Mozambique and Transparency International. Bringing together participants from Africa, Europe, and Latin America, the conference offered a platform to reflect on progress, challenges and gaps in asset recovery.
Corruption is not a victimless crime. Its costs go far beyond the money and property stolen. Corruption greatly undermines human dignity by depriving citizens of access to basic rights and services, including healthcare, education, justice, and economic opportunities. International and regional frameworks exist to combat corruption, and within them lies the potential for restorative justice by reshaping these processes to centre on human beings, particularly victims of corruption.
Many jurisdictions that sanction persons for corruption update their lists more frequently towards the end of each year. However, changes do take place in between and several changes have taken place in particular under the UK’s Global Anti-Corruption Sanctions since our beginning of year update.
Page 1 of 6
Next →
