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At Closing, Conference against Corruption Highlights Progress and Urges Hemispheric Cooperation to Face Pending Challenges

The Second Conference on the Progress and Challenges in Hemispheric Cooperation against Corruption ended today in Cali, Colombia, with the participation of the Secretary of Legal Affairs of the Organization of American States (OAS), Jean Michel Arrighi, and the Director of the Presidential Program of Modernization, Efficiency, Transparency, and the Fight against Corruption of the Republic of Colombia, Miguel Francisco Prado.

The OAS Secretary of Legal Affairs highlighted the participatory nature of the central issue of the conference, asserting that “many understood this issue as something pertinent to the internal sphere, and in reality what one sees today is the extension of some mechanisms of participation, exchange of knowledge, practices and experiences that were shared here.” The official urged participants in the conference to multiply the knowledge and “take the examples to strengthen their own institutions throughout the American continent.”

Secretary Arrighi concluded that “the progress we have reached on matters of progress and cooperation is very big,” though he also acknowledged the pending challenges. “You have underlined some pending activities, weaknesses or difficulties; but this road of cooperation, this inter-American mechanisms in which all of the countries of the Americas, from Canada to Argentina and Chile, participate in conditions of equality foresees a commitment of the State, civil society and in our case, the Organization of American States, in achieving the strengthening of the fight against corruption,” he concluded.

The Director of the Presidential Program of Modernization, Efficiency, Transparency, and the Fight against Corruption of the Republic of Colombia closed the event, highlighting its importance and expressing satisfaction with the Colombian government for hosting it. “Having the opportunity to celebrate this event in this city of Santiago de Cali, in which many seeds of hope have been planted and much work has been conducted for social development, has been very meaningful,” Miguel Francisco Prado said. The representative of the Presidency of Colombia invited participants to “broaden all these tools that have been shared through this event and evaluate them so they have a true application in each of our States.”

The Conference included the participation of almost 200 assistants, among them national and international public officials, experts on the subject of anti-corruption, representatives of civil society and delegates from the Member States of the OAS, who gathered for two days in the “Centro de Eventos Valle del Pacifico.”

The final session of the seminar held before the closing included the participation of the Director of Internal Control and Rationalization of Procedures of the Administration Department of the Public Secretariat of Colombia, María del Pilar Arango; the President of the International Anti Corruption Academy (IACA), Martin Kreutner; the Legal Advisor for the National Council of Transparency against Corruption of Panama and Vice Chair of the Committee of Experts of the MESICIC, Max Ballesteros; and the Vice Minister of Prevention, Promotion of Ethics, and Transparency of the Ministry of Institutional Transparency and the Fight against Corruption of Bolivia, Carlos Fernando Camargo Ticona, who presented diverse initiatives at the national, regional and international levels on quality management and training as tools for preventing corruption.

The issues debated in the panel included quality management in the public sector in specific cases, such as Colombia; initiatives and objectives of the International Anti Corruption Agency (IACA), inaugurated in 2010 and located in Austria; the project to create an Anti-corruption Regional Academy (ARAC) in Panama, including its characteristics, participant entities, activities and objectives; and the national research and training initiatives for the fight against corruption promoted by the Plurinational State of Bolivia through its Transparency in Public Management Program.

The Second Conference on the Progress and Challenges in Hemispheric Cooperation against Corruption, first held in Lima in May 2010, was organized by the OAS Department of Legal Cooperation with the collaboration of the Presidential Program of Modernization, Efficiency, Transparency, and the Fight against Corruption of Colombia and the Ministry of Foreign Affairs of that country.

The meeting was held in the context of the activities of the Mechanism for Follow-up on the Implementation of the Inter-American Convention against Corruption (MESICIC). The Inter-American Convention against Corruption was adopted in 1996 and was the first international legal instrument in this field that explicitly mentions among its principles the recognition of corruption as an internationally relevant issue and the need to have an instrument that promotes and facilitates cooperation among countries to fight it. The MESICIC is a follow-up tool to promote the development of the Convention through cooperation among States, that seeks to follow-up on the commitments assumed and facilitate the implementation of technical cooperation initiatives; the exchange of information; and the harmonization of States’ laws.

For more information, please visit the OAS Website at www.oas.org.

Reference: E-736/11