Kleptocracy: FBI Establishes International Corruption Squads, Targeting Foreign Bribery, Kleptocracy Crimes

The FBI web site offers a report on their establishing international corruption squads.

Late last year, Alstom—a French power and transportation company—pled guilty in U.S. federal court to engaging in a widespread foreign bribery scheme involving tens of millions of dollars. The company agreed to pay a record-setting $772 million fine to resolve the charges.

Alstom’s specific crimes? Violating the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) for more than a decade by paying bribes to government officials around the world—falsifying its books and records in the process—in connection with power, grid, and transportation projects for state-owned entities.  

The FCPA, passed in 1977, makes it illegal for U.S. companies, U.S. persons, and foreign corporations with certain U.S. ties to bribe foreign officials to obtain or retain business overseas. And we take these crimes very seriously—foreign bribery has the ability to impact U.S. financial markets, economic growth, and national security. It also breaks down the international free market system by promoting anti-competitive behavior and, ultimately, makes consumers pay more.

We’re seeing that foreign bribery incidents are increasingly tied to a type of government corruption known as kleptocracy, which is when foreign officials steal from their own government treasuries at the expense of their citizens.

You can read the rest of the report via the below link:

http://www.fbi.gov/news/stories/2015/march/fbi-establishes-international-corruption-squads/fbi-establishes-international-corruption-squads?utm_campaign=email-Daily&utm_medium=email&utm_source=fbi-top-stories&utm_content=417564