Tag: corruption

A sketchnote showing the asymmetric impact of the FATF Greylist on the global south and the global north

Articles in this Series

This is the fourth article in the series on how impunity breeds corruption. It examines why organizations like FATF are hypocritical and ineffective in controlling corruption and money-laundering.

The Financial Action Task Force (FATF) operates as the preeminent global standard-setter for anti-money laundering (AML) and countering the financing of terrorism (CFT). Established by the 1989 G7 Summit to protect the integrity of the international financial system, the FATF operates a vast regulatory apparatus that evaluates sovereign jurisdictions, issues binding recommendations, and publicly categorizes nations as greylisted or blacklisted based on their perceived compliance and systemic risk¹.

While the FATF positions itself as the noble “global standard-setter” for money laundering and terrorism financing, a deeper investigation reveals a “structural dissonance.” How can a list that claims to protect the world’s money end up impoverishing millions? The reality is that the FATF serves as a global gatekeeper, enforcing a regime where regulatory labels translate into real-world economic strangulation for the Global South while the world’s most sophisticated tax havens operate with near total impunity².

1. The Blacklist and the Greylist

1.1 The Blacklist: High-Risk Jurisdictions Subject to a Call for Action

The FATF blacklist is reserved for countries exhibiting the most serious, intractable strategic deficiencies in their AML/CFT frameworks¹. For these jurisdictions, the Task Force explicitly calls upon its members and all global jurisdictions to apply enhanced due diligence. In the most severe cases, countries are actively called upon to apply direct countermeasures to protect the international financial system from the ongoing risks emanating from these states. Currently, three countries are blacklisted: North Korea, Iran, and Myanmar, barring them from integrating into the global economy.

1.2 The Greylist: Jurisdictions Under Increased Monitoring

The greylist is a different regulatory tool. It identifies countries that are actively working with the FATF to address strategic deficiencies within agreed-upon timeframes¹. Placement on this list follows a rigorous Mutual Evaluation Report (MER) process. If a country is found to have a low or moderate level of effectiveness for nine or more of the Task Force’s eleven “Immediate Outcomes,” it enters a one-year observation period³. If the jurisdiction fails to adequately address these deficiencies during the observation period, it is publicly identified and placed on the greylist, requiring a high-level political commitment from the targeted government to implement an Action Plan developed in coordination with a FATF-Style Regional Body (FSRB)³.

Unlike the blacklist, the FATF does not explicitly instruct global financial institutions to apply enhanced due diligence or countermeasures against greylisted states³. Despite this lack of mandated sanctions, the list operates as a potent global risk signal, drawing the attention of international stakeholders who then apply their own risk analysis.

Between 2010 and 2020, 65 jurisdictions were placed on the greylist or blacklist. Notably, none of these jurisdictions belong to the G7, and only two, Argentina and Turkey, are members of the G20. The vast majority hail from the Global South, with 28 ranking in the bottom half of global economic output⁴.

In October 2024, responding to mounting criticism regarding the inherent inequity of this system, the FATF adjusted its prioritization criteria to relieve pressure on Least Developed Countries (LDCs). Under the revised criteria, the threshold for active review to jurisdictions with financial sector assets exceeding $10 billion was raised up from the previous $5 billion threshold⁵. LDCs are also no longer prioritized for active review unless they are deemed to pose a significant money laundering or terrorist financing risk, signalling an acknowledgment by the Task Force that its previous methodology disproportionately targeted the world’s most vulnerable economies.

2. The Double Standard

The current global compliance paradigm is built on a foundation of “systemic regulatory leniency” for the West and punitive oversight for everyone else. This is the core irony of the FATF: it aggressively monitors the “demand side” of illicit finance (developing nations struggling to build infrastructure) while leaving the “supply side” of global corruption virtually untouched². As we saw in the previous section, the public listings are almost exclusively populated by low-income, formerly colonized states in the Global South while the most powerful nations are never included.

This asymmetry ensures that the elite financial centres of the Global North such as the British Virgin Islands (BVI), Switzerland, Panama, the U.S. states like Delaware and Nevada and others discussed in the previous article, The Architecture of Global Impunity remain insulated. Wealthy nations utilize highly funded legal obfuscation to mask their non-compliance. For instance, the BVI delayed greylisting for years despite maintaining a beneficial ownership register that was virtually inaccessible to the public. On the other hand, low-capacity economies are forced to divert precious judicial resources away from schools and hospitals to satisfy the checklists of international evaluators.

Furthermore, when high-income or European jurisdictions are greylisted (such as Iceland, Malta, Croatia, Bulgaria, Monaco, or the BVI), their deep integration into global capital markets and high institutional capacity insulate them from the severe capital flight, de-risking, and macroeconomic attrition that devastate developing economies.

On a similar note, the European Union’s “uncooperative tax haven” blacklist targets small island states like Vanuatu (which accounts for less than 1% of global economic activity and a negligible fraction of global tax losses), while explicitly exempting EU and European Economic Area member states like Ireland, Luxembourg, and the Netherlands despite their hosting of massive corporate tax avoidance structures.

3. Consequences of Greylisting on Developing and LDCs

An infographic depicting the consequences of greylisting

3.1 Capital Flight and FDI Contraction

The most immediate and easily quantifiable economic impact of FATF greylisting is the rapid contraction of cross-border capital inflows. A seminal 2021 working paper by the International Monetary Fund (IMF), utilizing an inferential machine learning technique, established that greylisting results in a large and statistically significant reduction in capital inflows⁶. It determined that capital inflows decline, on average, by an astonishing 7.6% of the annual GDP following placement on the greylist.

Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) is sensitive to AML/CFT risk signals, as multinational corporations are highly averse to regulatory uncertainty and potential reputational damage. Data indicates a notable reduction in the ratio of fixed capital formation to GDP, shrinking by an average of 2% upon greylisting, with contractions up to 5% on average if a country is included on the blacklist⁷. Furthermore, empirical analyses utilizing global SWIFT data covering a decade of transactions demonstrated that greylisting leads to an immediate reduction of up to 10% in cross-border payments received by the targeted jurisdiction from the rest of the world⁷.

Interestingly, while banking and capital inflows fall dramatically (estimated between 1.3% and 2.6% of quarterly GDP) outflow responses are smaller and less robust, indicating a sudden cessation of incoming investment rather than a panicked exodus of domestic capital⁸. Crucially, the removal from the greylist does not result in an immediate return to baseline economic health. Delisting triggers only a partial recovery, generally between 40% and 70% with persistent frictions in re-establishing severed correspondent banking relationships and repairing sovereign reputational damage⁸.

Macroeconomic Variable	Observed Impact During Greylisting Period	Primary Mechanism of Contraction
Total Capital Inflows	Decline of 7.6% of GDP (Average)	Algorithmic de-risking by foreign institutional investors and reduced risk appetite.
Quarterly Banking/Capital Inflows	Decline of 1.3% to 2.6% of GDP	Immediate suspension of short-term credit lines and international interbank lending.
Foreign Direct Investment (FDI)	Decline of 2.0% to 5.0% of GDP	Postponement or cancellation of fixed capital formation due to perceived regulatory risk.
Cross-Border Payments (SWIFT)	Decline of up to 10.0% (inbound)	Severance of Correspondent Banking Relationships (CBRs) and trade-finance frictions.
Official Development Assistance	Statistically significant reduction	Reassessment of fiduciary risk by multilateral and bilateral donor agencies.

Summary of the macroeconomic effects of greylisting

3.2 Economic Cascades

For fragile economies, the initial shock to capital inflows triggers secondary and tertiary macroeconomic crises. Researchers outline several cascading mechanisms that systematically degrade a greylisted nation’s economic viability⁹.

The primary first-order effects begin with increased supplier costs. Domestic firms are forced to amend internal policies to respond to greylisting risk signals, facing heightened regulatory friction when attempting to clear international payments. Firms made inefficient by the inability to pass these costs onto consumers may reduce their goods on offer or exit the market entirely⁹. Concurrently, the reduced supply and increased cost of goods deeply erode profitability, which in turn diminishes the nation’s tax liability and aggregate corporate debt service capacity⁹.

Simultaneously, the state faces reduced national income and restricted access to capital. International bond and loan markets view the listing negatively, putting immediate upward pressure on both government borrowing levels and corporate credit spreads⁹. The risk premium on lending balloons, starving the domestic market of liquidity. Furthermore, net Official Development Assistance (ODA), International Bank for Reconstruction and Development (IBRD) loans, and International Development Association (IDA) credits undergo statistically significant reductions during greylisting periods, as donor agencies renegotiate measures to address the new risk profile⁹.

These reductions in development assistance frequently continue even after the country is officially delisted⁹. These primary shocks culminate in a second order “downward profitability spiral“. Higher reference rates and corporate spreads create a double shock to debt and equity markets. This dynamic produces structural increases in non-performing bank loans, threatening the stability of the domestic banking sector, and driving down the total market capitalization of listed domestic companies⁹.

3.3 De-Risking and the Collapse of Correspondent Banking

3.3.1 De-risking and correspondent banking

De-risking is the practice whereby global financial institutions decide to avoid, rather than to manage, possible money laundering or terrorist financing risks by wholesale terminating or restricting business relationships with entire countries, regions, or classes of customers¹⁰. It collapses correspondent banking.

When a mid-sized enterprise in a developing nation, such as Barbados, needs to pay a supplier in Jamaica in US dollars, their respective local banks (respondent banks) cannot interface directly. They must utilize intermediaries connected to the US Federal Reserve System. These intermediaries, typically massive global banks located in the developed financial centres, are the “correspondent banks”¹¹. Over 7,000 banks utilize the SWIFT network to maintain more than one million individual correspondent banking relationships (CBRs). These pathways facilitate foreign exchange, trade finance, the execution of securities transactions, and the channelling of small, aggregated payments from money transfer operators handling diaspora remittances¹¹.

3.3.2 Compliance vs. Profitability

When a developing or least-developed jurisdiction is greylisted, the correspondent banks face a sudden compliance obligations. Although the FATF standards require financial institutions to identify and manage the risks associated with cross-border relationships, in a post-2008 regulatory environment characterized by multi-billion-dollar financial penalties, the banks frequently engage in risk-avoidance¹².

The decision to de-risk is fundamentally driven by a cold cost-benefit analysis. The sheer cost of maintaining specialized compliance personnel, running algorithmic transaction monitoring, updating risk models, and facing potential regulatory fines far outweighs the relatively negligible profit margins generated by facilitating remittances or trade finance for small Global South economies¹³.

A joint report by the Bank for International Settlements (BIS) and the Committee on Payments and Market Infrastructures (CPMI) highlighted that where capital and liquidity are scarce and expensive, banks will ruthlessly prune business lines in jurisdictions with low financial volumes and low profitability¹⁴. The data reveals that having low financial volumes and low profitability is a far more significant statistical predictor for being de-risked by global banks than actual illicit financial activity¹⁴. No global bank wants to be the “last man standing” engaging with a potentially risky, low-profit respondent bank¹³.

3.3.3 The Paradox

The irony of de-risking is that it actively undermines the FATF’s core mission of financial transparency. By terminating formal banking channels for vulnerable nations, de-risking drives legitimate financial flows, including life-saving humanitarian aid, charitable giving, and diaspora remittances, out of the regulated banking sector and into less regulated, non-transparent, or entirely informal channels, such as the hawala or hundi system or cash-bulk smuggling¹⁰.

This mass financial exclusion increases the very money laundering and terrorist financing risks the FATF seeks to mitigate¹⁰. Despite the FATF and the Financial Stability Board (FSB) issuing explicit guidance stating that wholesale de-risking is a misapplication of the risk-based approach, global financial institutions continue the practice unabated¹⁰. They do so because, within the paradigm of Western financial regulation, abandoning the Global South remains economically rational for private capital.

3.4 Geopolitical Implications

3.4.1 The Oligarchy of Standard-Setting

The FATF, the OECD, and the European Union effectively dictate global financial rules while forcing compliance upon nations entirely excluded from their core membership⁴. The hypocrisy embedded in this dynamic is stark: data from the Tax Justice Network indicates that OECD member states are responsible for over two-thirds of the world’s corporate tax abuse, and EU parliamentarians have confirmed that EU countries host or account for 36% of the world’s tax havens⁴. Yet, the FATF grey and blacklists are almost exclusively populated by formerly colonized or low-income states (e.g., Vanuatu, Senegal, South Sudan, Jamaica)⁴.

When the EU issues its own “uncooperative tax haven” blacklists, it routinely targets tiny island economies like Vanuatu. The countries populating the EU blacklists account for less than 1.1% of global economic activity and a mathematically insignificant 2% of worldwide tax revenue losses⁴. Meanwhile, the EU entirely ignores the massive, highly sophisticated tax avoidance structures hosted internally by Ireland, the Netherlands, or Luxembourg, shielding Western capital from the very regulatory wrath it unleashes on the Global South⁴.

3.4.2 Weaponization of Compliance

FATF listing processes have proven highly susceptible to geopolitical lobbying. The continuous pressure to keep Pakistan on the greylist, for instance, was heavily influenced by regional geopolitical rivalries, with India utilizing plenary sessions to push for isolating Islamabad diplomatically and economically¹⁹. While the rationale for targeting terror financing networks is legally legitimate, the selective application of this standard raises critical geopolitical questions. Global South nations are subjected to intense scrutiny, while Western jurisdictions routinely fail to rein in massive money laundering networks with little fear of being economically crippled by a downgrade.

3.4.3 Other Implications

The systemic bias of the current AML/CFT architecture is generating massive geopolitical ripple effects that threaten the long-term cohesion of the global financial system.

The continuous weaponization of compliance, coupled with the de-risking executed by Western correspondent banks, ultimately incentivizes the bifurcation of global finance. Sovereign developing and least-developed states, facing constant threats of being cut off from the SWIFT network and US dollar clearing systems, are increasingly motivated to explore alternative financial architectures. This drives structural momentum toward bilateral currency swaps, the development of central bank digital currencies (CBDCs), and integration into non-Western payment infrastructures, aiming to bypass FATF-dominated choke points.

Furthermore, because Western tax havens are rarely sanctioned or forced to dismantle their secrecy laws, stolen assets from the Global South remain permanently trapped in the Global North. The lack of FATF enforcement against the lawyers, real estate agents, and accountants operating in metropolitan centers ensures that grand corruption remains a highly lucrative, low-risk endeavor for kleptocrats, provided the illicit capital flows North.

Ultimately, this dynamic accelerates institutional delegitimization. The credibility of international oversight bodies is rapidly deteriorating in the eyes of the developing world. Xolisile Khanyile, head of South Africa’s Financial Intelligence Centre, received the Financial Crime Fighter Award for 2022, but in the exact same month the FATF decided to greylist the country. This underscores a profound, unbridgeable disconnect between local institutional effort and structural, top-down punishment⁴.

4. Case Studies

4.1 The Macroeconomic Decimation of Pakistan (2008-2019)

The most comprehensively documented example of greylisting-induced economic destruction is Pakistan. Due to complex regional geopolitics and historical policies regarding militant groups, Pakistan has been placed on the FATF greylist three times: 2008-2010, 2012-2015, and 2018-2022¹⁵. Because of the recurring nature of these listings, economists possess unique longitudinal data to isolate the “FATF effect” from broader macroeconomic trends.

A rigorous econometric study published by the Islamabad-based Tabadlab utilized the synthetic control method (established by Abadie and Gardeazabal in 2003) to create a counterfactual “Synthetic Pakistan“, a mathematical model of how the economy would have evolved in the absolute absence of FATF interventions¹⁶. The results are devastating. Between 2008 and 2019, FATF greylisting resulted in a cumulative real GDP loss for Pakistan of approximately $38 billion¹⁶.

The Tabadlab research breaks down the precise mechanisms of this macroeconomic attrition. Approximately 58% of the GDP decline was driven by a drastic, prolonged reduction in both household and government consumption expenditures, which plummeted by $22 billion relative to the synthetic baseline¹⁶. Skepticism surrounding the economy’s future outlook severely hindered gross capital formation, leading to cumulative losses of $4.5 billion in exports and $3.6 billion in inward FDI¹⁶.

The sanctioning period between 2012 and 2015 cost the Pakistani economy approximately $13.43 billion¹⁶. Upon delisting in June 2015, the economy began a slow recovery, culminating in marginal GDP gains in 2017 and early 2018¹⁶. However, the country’s re-entry onto the greylist in June 2018 instantly obliterated these gains. In 2019 alone, the economy sustained a devastating single-year loss of $10.31 billion¹⁶. This economic strangulation coincided with severe domestic financial vulnerability, including a gross public debt-to-GDP ratio reaching 87% (and eventually 107%), rampant inflation, and foreign exchange reserves dwindling to a mere $12 billion¹⁶.

4.2 Economic Crisis in Nepal

Nepal’s return to the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) greylist in February 2025, its second time being listed in 17 years, has triggered a multidimensional economic crisis for the country. Because the list acts as a global risk signal, it has directly impacted Nepal’s remittance-dependent economy, foreign investment prospects, and international credibility^{17, 18}.

Recent reporting and economic analyses highlight several specific areas where Nepal’s economy is declining due to the listing:

Macroeconomic Contraction and Capital Flight: A study by the International Monetary Fund (IMF) estimated that greylisting negatively affects Nepal’s capital inflows, projecting an average decline of 7.6% of its Gross Domestic Product (GDP) and an average 3% drop in Foreign Direct Investment (FDI). A year into the recent 2025 listing, these declines in foreign investment have already begun to materialize as international investors avoid the heightened regulatory risks.
Banking and Trade Frictions: The greylisting has made cross-border banking significantly slower and more expensive. Foreign correspondent banks are increasingly reluctant to maintain ties with Nepali financial institutions to avoid regulatory penalties, which increases transaction costs and delays. Furthermore, documentary requirements for export and import payments, such as letters of credit, have become much stricter, raising costs for domestic businesses and impeding trade flows.
Threats to Remittances: Remittances account for nearly 25% of Nepal’s GDP, making it the lifeline of the national economy. The heightened scrutiny and delays placed on cross-border financial transfers directly disrupt these flows, creating immediate financial hardship for millions of Nepali families relying on funds sent from abroad.
Access to International Aid: The listing significantly complicates negotiations with multilateral donors, such as the World Bank, Asian Development Bank, and the IMF, which limits Nepal’s access to vital external funding and development assistance.
Diplomatic and Travel Restrictions: The economic fallout has spilled over into international mobility. Following the FATF listing, the European Union officially classified Nepal as a “high-risk third country” in June 2025. Consequently, Nepali citizens, including senior government and central bank officials, are facing visa restrictions from European, North American, and Asian nations. Applicants are frequently subjected to intensive documentation requests and video interrogations to prove the legitimacy of their financial transactions.

Ultimately, reports emphasize that the structural vulnerabilities in Nepal’s anti-money laundering and counter-terrorist financing frameworks are resulting in severe reputational damage, leaving the country economically isolated and heavily restricting its access to global capital markets.

5. Conclusion

The empirical record provided by historical data, machine learning analytics, and longitudinal case studies is unequivocal. The FATF greylisting mechanism operates as an economic weapon of mass attrition against the Global South, triggering devastating capital flight, the collapse of correspondent banking, and severe macroeconomic contraction, vividly evidenced by the $38 billion loss inflicted on Pakistan. Conversely, the architects of global financial secrecy in the West operate with near-total impunity, enabling trillions of dollars in tax evasion, capital flight, and grand corruption to flow unimpeded through their jurisdictions.

While the FATF’s recent October 2024 policy adjustment, i.e., raising the threshold for active review to shield the smallest economies from immediate evaluation, is a necessary bureaucratic reform, it remains woefully insufficient to address the underlying asymmetry⁵. A truly equitable AML/CFT architecture cannot exist as long as the definition of financial crime remains violently one-sided.

Until the FATF, the OECD, and the broader global regulatory consensus pivot their enforcement mechanisms to aggressively target the “supply side” of corruption, specifically dismantling the corporate secrecy veils in Delaware, London, and the Caribbean, the international compliance regime will remain an instrument of structural geopolitical control rather than a genuine engine of financial integrity. Moving forward, true global financial stability requires that the regulatory gaze shifts permanently from the poorest, most vulnerable nodes of the financial system to the apex jurisdictions that systematically launder the wealth of the world.

Works Cited

“Black and grey” lists – FATF, https://www.fatf-gafi.org/en/countries/black-and-grey-lists.html
Tax Havens: Crucibles of financial turmoil and grand corruption, https://www.taxjustice.net/cms/upload/pdf/Hammamet_-_Crucibles_of_Financial_Turmoil_-_JUL-2009-2.pdf
The impact of grey listing by the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) – U4 Helpdesk Answer, https://knowledgehub.transparencycdn.org/kproducts/Impact-of-FATF-grey-listing_final-paper.pdf
The Black & White of Greylisting – Financial Center Association of Vanuatu, https://fca.vu/south-african-business-paper-denounces-the-hypocrisy-of-aml-blacklists/
FATF changes its grey listing criteria to further focus on risk, https://www.fatf-gafi.org/en/publications/Fatfgeneral/FATF-grey-listing-criteria.html
The Impact of Gray-Listing on Capital Flows: An Analysis Using Machine Learning, https://www.elibrary.imf.org/view/journals/001/2021/153/article-A001-en.xml
The Economic Impact of FATF Grey-Listing | White & Case LLP, https://www.whitecase.com/insight-alert/economic-impact-fatf-grey-listing
Do Warnings Change Behavior? Money-Laundering, Grey-Listing by the FATF, and Cross-Border Financial Flows – IDB Publications, https://publications.iadb.org/publications/english/document/Do-Warnings-Change-Behavior-Money-laundering-Grey-listing-by-the-FATF-and-Cross-border-Financial-Flows.pdf
Economic Consequences of Greylisting by the Financial Action Task Force – MDPI, https://www.mdpi.com/2227-9091/11/5/81
Guidance on Correspondent Banking – FATF, https://www.fatf-gafi.org/en/publications/Fatfrecommendations/Correspondent-banking-services.html
Chapter 16. Pressures on Correspondent Banking: Impact, Drivers, and Responses in, https://www.elibrary.imf.org/display/book/9781513523002/ch017.xml
FATF Guidance on Correspondent Banking Services, https://www.fatf-gafi.org/content/dam/fatf-gafi/guidance/Guidance-Correspondent-Banking-Services.pdf
Seminar Summary: Discussion on De-Risking in: Law & Financial Stability – IMF eLibrary, https://www.elibrary.imf.org/display/book/9781513523002/ch018.xml
The Department of the Treasury’s De-Risking Strategy, https://home.treasury.gov/system/files/136/Treasury_AMLA_23_508.pdf
Research shows that FATF grey-listing from 2008 to 2019 has caused losses of over $38 billion to Pakistan’s GDP – EFSAS, https://www.efsas.org/commentaries/fatf-grey-listing-from-2008-to-2019-has-caused-losses-of-over-$38-billion-to-pakistan/
Bearing the Cost of Global Politics – Tabadlab | Understanding Change, https://tabadlab.com/bearing-the-cost-of-global-politics/
Nepal’s FATF Grey Listing: A Multidimensional Crisis of Governance and Economic Stability, https://nepsealpha.com/post/detail/6433/nepal-s-fatf-grey-listing-a-multidimensional-crisis-of-governance-and-economic-stability
FIU-Nepal Newsletter, https://nrb.org.np/contents/uploads/2025/05/FIU-Nepal-Newsletter-May-2025-%E2%80%93-Issue-IV.pdf
Pakistan’s Economy Will Be Tattered If It Comes In FATF List – The secretariat, https://thesecretariat.in/article/pakistan-s-economy-will-be-tattered-if-it-comes-in-fatf-list

Corruption, Impunity, and Conflict: Insights on How Corruption Triggers War

By Sandeept

On August 21, 2026

In Impunity and Corruption, Blogging, Opinion

Articles in this series

This is the third article is a part of a series on how impunity breeds corruption. The series will begin with Nepal, look at corruption at global level, examine why organizations like FATF are ineffective.

Modern statecraft is based on the social contract, an implicit agreement where citizens surrender certain liberties to the state in exchange for security, equitable governance, and the rule of law. However, systemic corruption and culture of impunity dismantle the contract. The state ceases to be a protector and transforms into a predator, using its power to exploit the very people it was mandated to serve and protect.

Historically, the international community viewed corruption as a secondary symptom of war that flourished in the vacuum left by fighting. Modern analysis demands a paradigm shift: Corruption and impunity are the fundamental root causes of conflict and war.¹ By delegitimizing the state and closing off peaceful paths for redress, grand corruption acts as the primary catalyst for political violence and state collapse.

In this post…

Why Corruption transforms into Violence

While corruption is always corrosive, its impact on peace follows a specific trajectory. Statistical modelling based on the Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI) reveals that states with strong democratic institutions can often absorb marginal increases in corruption with little immediate effect on overall peacefulness. However, once a specific threshold is breached, the state collapses.²

This “tipping point” occurs when corruption penetrates the police and the judiciary. Once these institutions are captured, the state loses its monopoly on the legitimate use of force and its capacity for impartial dispute resolution. At this stage, even small subsequent increase in corruption result in dramatic, exponential increase in violence.²

When the judiciary falls, the rule of law is effectively dead.² Citizens no longer see the courts as a path to justice, but as a weapon used by elites to protect their own interests. This reality forces marginalized populations to seek “vigilante justice” and “armed community defence groups” to ensure their own security and resource distribution. This institutional void is precisely where insurgencies and violent extremism take root.

How Embezzlement Kills Before the First Shot is Fired

Grand corruption should be understood as “structural violence”. (See: The Architecture of Global Impunity: 5 Reasons the World’s Biggest Thieves). It is a form of harm that occurs long before the first shot of an armed conflict is fired. When high-level officials divert public funds into foreign havens, they are not only stealing the money but are also depriving the population of healthcare, education, and infrastructure.³

Such a systemic theft creates the desperate conditions that make rebellion a rational choice for the marginalized.² By widening inequalities and starving specific regions of resources, kleptocrats manufacture the grievances that non-state actors can weaponize.

The national Truth and Reconciliation Commission in Liberia explicitly found that endemic corruption, which limited access to education, justice, and economic opportunities was the root cause of the Liberian civil war.⁴ Similarly, corruption was recognized as a fundamental trigger for the Arab Spring-related in Tunisia.⁴

State Capture

There is a critical distinction between “petty bribery” and “state capture”. Whereas petty bribery is an administrative nuisance, state capture is an existential threat to national security. In a captured state, powerful “gilded criminals” undemocratically shape the nation’s legal institutions and policies to illicitly enrich themselves with absolute impunity.

This architecture of impunity is rarely a domestic effort alone. It is sustained by a transnational network of enablers, including bankers, lawyers, and real estate agents, who facilitate the cross-border money laundering.⁵ Such a system also facilitates environment crimes and illicit trades like illegal drugs and wildlife trade. On top of that, these corrupt networks provide continuous funds to armed combatants and insurgent groups, ensuring that civil wars remain profitable for those at the top. In this environment, law is no longer a tool for justice; it is a shield used by the lawless to maintain power.

State capture is also achieved through election frauds and patronage networks. Vote-buying, nepotism, chumocracy, and monopolization of public offices create an unfair ground in favour of persons or parties who can spend as much money as they can. The result is damage in political inclusivity, disenfranchisement of the minority and lower class, and justification for anti-state violence.

Typology of Institutional Corruption	Mechanism of State Delegitimization	Impact on Conflict Dynamics and Peacefulness
Judicial Capture	Elites weaponize courts against opponents; ordinary citizens are denied fair trials and equitable dispute resolution.	Eliminates non-violent avenues for redress, forcing marginalized groups toward armed rebellion and organized insurgencies.
Police Corruption	Law enforcement acts with impunity, engages in extortion, or ignores crime unless bribed by criminal syndicates.	Erodes baseline physical security; fosters vigilante justice, armed community defense groups, and the rise of violent extremism.
Executive Embezzlement	Massive diversion of public resources into foreign jurisdictions and offshore accounts via transnational enablers.	Triggers severe economic marginalization, drastically underfunds public services, and widens horizontal inequalities.
Electoral Fraud & Patronage	Subversion of the democratic process through vote-buying, nepotism, and the monopolization of public offices.	Destroys political inclusivity, disenfranchising minority or lower-caste groups and providing ideological justification for anti-state violence.

Lessons from Nepal: Why “Peace Agreements” Don’t Diffuse Conflict

The history of Nepal provides a warning: Changing leaders does not bring peace if the underlying “rules of game” remain corrupt. In 1996, the Maoist conflict began with the Maoists presenting a 40-point list of demands to address social discrimination, rampant corruption, and elite impunity.⁶ The government, however, shut the door to peaceful resolution. The resulting Civil War claimed lives of over 13000 to 17000. Thousands remain injured, disappeared, and displaced from their homes.

While the 2006 peace agreement ended the formal fighting, it failed to dismantle the culture of impunity. The process of “ideological dilution” integrated the former revolutionaries into the government, where they adopted the same kleptocratic tendencies they once fought.⁶ They formed pact with former enemies to protect one another from prosecution for war crimes, proving that they had become new elites. The result was that many criminals were protected as “revolutionaries” and atrocities pardoned.⁷

The unresolved impunity increased corruption because politicians and bureaucrats and felt sure no matter what they do, they would remain unpunished. It directly led to the September 8-9 uprising (See: Nepal’s Gen Z is protesting corruption in the aftermath of ridiculous social media ban). Youth protesters took to the streets wearing school uniforms to symbolize their “stolen futures”. The conflict and violence thus ensued took lives of more than 70 (45 listed as martyrs) and government properties worth billions burned.⁸

Two governments–one interim and another elected–have already served for almost a year. But the demands of accountability and punishment against the corrupt in the protests have been muffled. No substantial punitive action has been seen against anyone involved in the murder of youths and arson of government offices. Ironically, those accused of violence and arson on seemingly opposite sides took part in parliamentary elections. Some of them won. Impunity is rooted as strongly as ever.

Conclusion

The 2025/2026 crisis in Nepal serves as a definitive warning that institutional integrity is a prerequisite for peace. When elites are allowed to loot their nations with impunity, they push their societies toward a tipping point where violence becomes inevitable. Common people, however, are at the receiving ends of violence from both the state-controlling elites as well as the insurgents. Without definitive punishment against their crimes, the individuals, the nation, and eventually, the entire world keep suffering.

True conflict prevention requires the international community to look beyond traditional diplomacy and address the financial rot at the heart of state fragility. We must confront a fundamental contradiction in modern politics: Should “national sovereignty” continue to serve as a legal shield for leaders who systematically loot their own nations and drive their people toward war?

Works Cited

Some Stirring Around in the Governance Soup, https://www.researchgate.net/publication/23755473_Corruption_and_Armed_Conflicts_Some_Stirring_Around_in_the_Governance_Soup
LOWERING CORRUPTION – Institute for Economics & Peace, https://www.economicsandpeace.org/wp-content/uploads/2015/06/Peace-and-Corruption.pdf
Statement submitted by Transparency International, a non-governmental organization in consultative status with the Economic and – UNODC, https://www.unodc.org/documents/treaties/UNCAC/COSP/session10/NGO/CAC-COSP-2023-NGO48.pdf
Module 11 Corruption, Peace and Security – GRACE Initiative – UNODC, https://grace.unodc.org/grace/uploads/documents/academics/Anti-Corruption_Module_11_Corruption_Peace_and_Security.PDF
Tax Havens: Crucibles of financial turmoil and grand corruption, https://www.taxjustice.net/cms/upload/pdf/Hammamet_-_Crucibles_of_Financial_Turmoil_-_JUL-2009-2.pdf
The Political Economy of Civil War in Nepal, https://www.researchgate.net/publication/222602808_The_Political_Economy_of_Civil_War_in_Nepal
Authority without accountability: The struggle for justice in Nepal – International Commission of Jurists, https://www.icj.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/ICJ-AUTHORITY-WITHOUT-ACCOUNTABILITY-final-1.pdf
Nepal’s Broil for a New System Change, https://news.slvlog.net/nepals-broil-for-a-new-system-change/

The Architecture of Global Impunity: 5 Reasons the World’s Biggest Thieves Almost Never Go to Jail

By Sandeept

On August 17, 2026

In Impunity and Corruption, essay, Opinion

Articles in this series

This is the second article in series on how impunity breeds corruption. The series began with Nepal, and now looks at global impunity and corruption. It will eventually examine why organizations like FATF are ineffective in controlling global corruption.

“Grand corruption is a transnational issue that no single country can cope with alone.”

— Richard Goldstone, Retired South African Judge

In contemporary governance, the intersection of impunity and corruption represents one of the most formidable barriers to sustainable development, human rights, and the maintenance of the international rule of law, as explained in the previous article with respect to Nepal. Nepal is not an isolated case, though. Global impunity allows grand corruption—a systemic, highly organized pathology characterized by the abuse of high-level power that benefits a concentrated elite at the direct expense of the broader population¹. While these crimes are devastating, the perpetrators rarely face consequences.

The United Nations has explicitly recognized the negative impacts of this phenomenon at the High-Level Meeting on the Rule of Law, and the United Nations’ Convention Against Corruption (UNCAC)² has been ratified by almost all member nations. However, the lack of accountability is a structurally engineered feature of modern power. By ensuring domestic legal frameworks remain impotent and international laws mere suggestions, the elites have created a widespread nexus of global impunity and corruption.

Enablers of Global Impunity and Corruption:

Enablers of Global Impunity and Corruption

1. Grand Corruption, Kleptocracy, Chumocracy, and State Capture

Grand corruption, defined by Transparency International, is an organized crime that benefits the few at the expense of others³. It involves offenses by public officials outlined in UNCAC Articles 15 through 25, including bribery, embezzlement, misappropriation of public funds or resources, or gross violations of the human rights of a substantial part of the population or vulnerable groups. It usually evolves into kleptocracy and chumocracy.

In a kleptocracy, political leaders utilize their authority to expropriate the wealth of the governed, ensuring that the society and its economy cannot function without a constant, systemic upward flow of bribes.

Chumocracy is the rule by a group of elites who reinforce each other in the state mechanism. It is marked by nepotism and favouritism. Kleptocracy and chumocracy lead to state capture.

State capture is a condition in which powerful individuals, groups, and organizations undemocratically shape a nation’s policies, legal institutions, and economic environment to illicitly enrich themselves with absolute impunity¹. They don’t just circumvent rules but manipulate legislative and bureaucratic procedures to provide legitimacy to their malfeasance. When the law itself is the loot, traditional law enforcement becomes an impossible dream.

2. Weaponization of the Justice System

The relationship between corruption, impunity, and the judiciary is complex and dual-faceted. On one hand, bribery and undue influence constitute an insurmountable obstacle to accessing justice, allowing powerful elites to interfere with judges and prosecutors to block legal proceedings, thereby securing their own impunity⁴. On the other hand, corrupt regimes frequently weaponize the captured justice system against their populations. Elites rely on these corrupted judicial apparatuses to actively pursue, punish, and silence journalists, civil society actors, and political opponents who attempt to expose or criticize the kleptocratic system^⁴.

This dynamic reveals impunity not merely as the passive absence of justice, but as the active deployment of injustice to protect illicit wealth and consolidate political control¹. This also means grand corruption is akin to human rights violations. By suppressing the rights to a fair trial, freedom of expression, and access to information, the state prevents civil society and opponents from participating in anti-corruption efforts. The resulting atmosphere of fear ensures that victims have no tangible legal recourse.

Phenomenon	Conceptual Definition	Mechanism of Impunity
Grand Corruption	Abuse of high-level power benefiting a few at the expense of many, involving gross misappropriation of resources.	Perpetrators leverage political authority to halt investigations and secure pardons or immunity from prosecution.
Kleptocracy	A governance system completely based on corruption, where the state exists to enrich the ruling elite.	Control over all state organs ensures that the police, prosecutors, and courts serve the corrupt leaders rather than the law.
State Capture	Undemocratic shaping of a nation’s policies and legal institutions by powerful individuals or groups.	Formal legislative and bureaucratic procedures are manipulated to legalize illicit enrichment and shield enablers.
Weaponized Justice	The use of corrupted judicial systems to target and punish critics, whistleblowers, and political opposition.	Eliminates accountability by legally persecuting those who attempt to expose the corrupt system, creating a chilling effect.

3. Gilded Criminals hiding in Plain Sight

The recognition that elite power can be used to commit crimes with total immunity is a decades-old concern. In 1975, the 5th UN Congress on Crime Prevention introduced the term “Gilded Criminals.”⁵ This term is used to describe actors with immense political or economic power who wield it with absolute impunity, injuring the broader community for narrow oligarchic benefit. The Congress noted that the offenses of these individuals ranged widely from bribery and grand corruption to the outright torture of persons in state custody⁵.

The international community deepened this analysis at the 6th UN Crime Congress in 1980. That summit added “abuse of economic power” to the global agenda, calling for urgent interregional action to address high-level systemic malfeasance. This historical evolution highlights that the world has long understood that the “power elite” can commit offenses ranging from grand corruption to state-sanctioned torture while remaining untouched by national laws⁵. However, nothing substantial has been done to solve the issue.

4. Global Transnational Enabler Ecosystem

Grand corruption is rarely confined within the borders of a single nation. Kleptocrats and corrupt public officials operate within a highly sophisticated, globalized ecosystem that facilitates the extraction, concealment, and laundering of illicit wealth across multiple jurisdictions¹. This “supply side” of corruption involves professional gatekeepers who provide a veneer of legal complexity to illicit transactions.

This globalized network of enablers, their primary functions, and contributions to global impunity are tabulated below:

Enabler Category	Primary Function in the Corruption Lifecycle	Contribution to Global Impunity
Trust and company service providers (TCSPs)	Origination of illicit funds via the payment of bribes for state contracts and resource access.	Normalizes corrupt practices in international trade and exploits power asymmetries.
Global Financial Institutions	Layering and integration of illicit funds; bypassing anti-money laundering protocols.	Provides the critical infrastructure required to move vast sums of money into secrecy jurisdictions.
Legal & Accounting Professionals	Structuring opaque corporate vehicles (shell companies, trusts) to hide beneficial ownership.	Creates a veneer of legal complexity that paralyzes domestic law enforcement investigations.
Real Estate & Luxury Asset Brokers	Facilitating the final integration of laundered funds into safe-haven physical assets.	Allows kleptocrats to enjoy the proceeds of crime internationally, entirely removing the domestic deterrent effect.

5. The Enforcement Vacuum of Global Treaties

The primary international tool against graft is the UNCAC². It has been adopted by between 190 and 192 governments and provides an excellent guide on the criminalization of grand corruption and mechanisms for jurisdictions. However, it faces a critical structural deficit as it relies entirely on domestic systems for enforcement.

This creates an inescapable paradox: the UNCAC requires laws on the books, but kleptocrats control the domestic police, prosecutors, and courts meant to enforce them. In autocratic and nominally democratic captured states, laws are present but functionally ineffective. This “enforcement vacuum” leaves the international community with no independent authority to hold the most powerful leaders accountable.

Examples of Elite Protection and Global Impunity

1. The Epstein Case

The Jeffrey Epstein Files provide a modern case study in how immense wealth and political influence generate an impenetrable shield of impunity for systemic crimes. The documents released by the U.S. Department of Justice (DOJ) extend beyond individual psychological depravity, exposing a vast, transnational network woven seamlessly through the highest corridors of power in politics, business, academia, and international royalty⁶. It is a stark demonstration of how the ruling class utilizes its wealth to operate entirely outside the boundaries of the societies they purportedly lead.

The scandal implicated the involvement of powerful individuals, including the U.S. Presidents Donald Trump and Bill Clinton, technology billionaires Elon Musk and Bill Gates, academic Noam Chomsky, and various members of European royalty (for example, former Prince Andrew). The records clearly exemplify chumocracy, where elites favour each other even when they appear as rivals. Despite the scale of these files and UN independent experts stating that the atrocities met the threshold for crimes against humanity⁷, no new criminal charges have been pressed.

2. Sovereign Bond Misappropriation (Malaysia and Mozambique)

As explained above, grand corruption is enabled through the complicity of prestigious global financial gatekeepers located in advanced economies. In widely publicized schemes, major banking institutions based in the United States and Switzerland actively conspired with high-level officials in Malaysia and Mozambique, respectively¹. These financial institutions facilitated the systematic misappropriation of billions of dollars in public funds that had been originally raised through the issuance of sovereign government bonds.

3. Developed Democracies as Global Tax Havens

Tax havens run by the Global North are the biggest enablers of money laundering and terrorism financing. The Tax Justice Network’s Corporate Tax Haven Index ranks British Overseas Territories (like the British Virgin Islands, Bermuda, and the Cayman Islands), the United Kingdom, Switzerland, Luxembourg, the Netherlands, and U.S. states (such as Delaware and Nevada) as the apex predators of global financial secrecy.

By offering absolute secrecy, the tax havens function as laundromats for illicit wealth generated through drug trafficking, extortion, human trafficking, bribery, and the plundering of public treasuries in the Global South. However, oversight bodies like the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) aggressively police the Global South, which includes the demand side and transit nodes of illicit finance in developing nations, but insulate the supply side of financial opacity orchestrated by the Global North⁸.

Wealthy elites from the developing countries stashing untaxed assets in these offshore secrecy jurisdictions cost governments $200 billion annually. Sub-Saharan Africa alone has lost over $1 trillion in illicit financial flows in recent decades, draining vital capital from poor countries to wealthy ones⁹.

On the other hand, multinational corporations artificially shift profits to these low-tax jurisdictions (using accounting tricks like exorbitant brand royalties), costing global governments $500 billion to $600 billion in lost tax revenue annually⁹.

Proposed Solution: The International Anti-Corruption Court

Recognizing the severe limitations of domestic enforcement, the lack of an international prosecutorial mechanism within the UNCAC, and the failure of existing frameworks to meet the Sustainable Development Goals, a formidable global coalition has emerged to actively advocate for the establishment of an International Anti-Corruption Court (IACC). During the 2014 World Forum on Governance, United States District Judge Mark L. Wolf initially presented the concept, subsequently detailing it extensively in a seminal paper titled “The Case for an International Anti-Corruption Court”¹⁰.

Operating under the “Doctrine of Complementarity,” the IACC would only intervene when a national justice system is “unwilling or unable” to act¹⁰. This ensures that the court respects state sovereignty while eliminating the safe harbors currently provided by captured domestic judiciaries.

The IACC would focus on enforcing five core crimes already established by the UNCAC¹⁰:

Bribery of national officials.
Bribery of foreign officials.
Embezzlement and misappropriation of public funds.
Money laundering.
Obstruction of justice related to these offenses.

Crucially, the court would have the authority to address “territorial facilitation.” If a kleptocrat from a non-member state launders money through an IACC member state, the court could exercise jurisdiction over the laundering offense. This targets both the “demand side” (corrupt officials) and the “supply side” (corporations and professional enablers).

Conclusion

The persistence of grand corruption in the twenty-first century is not the result of an absence of international laws, nor is it a consequence of a lack of understanding regarding its devastating impacts on global society. Through instruments like the UNCAC, the international community has successfully established a universal consensus on the inherent criminality of these acts. Instead, the global corruption crisis is fundamentally a crisis of impunity. It is sustained by a glaring architectural flaw in the international governance system: the absolute reliance on domestic institutions to prosecute political elites who possess the requisite power to capture, dismantle, and weaponize those very institutions.

On top of grand corruption, the intersection of extreme wealth, political authority, and legal opacity has birthed a global ruling class that operates with devastating impunity. Whether manifested in the transnational abuse networks exposed by the Epstein files in the West or the kleptocratic resource hoarding, elites subvert state institutions for private gain.

The future of global accountability lies in a shift toward “asset recovery” and restorative justice. By centralizing investigative expertise, an international court could track the opaque financial flows that baffle under-resourced domestic agencies. The ultimate goal is to freeze, recover, and repurpose stolen wealth to fund essential public services like healthcare and education.

A growing geopolitical consensus suggests that the age of absolute domestic impunity must end. The question remains: is the international community ready to prioritize the global rule of law over the sovereign right of leaders to steal? Until a robust, internationalized enforcement mechanism is realized, the architecture of impunity will continue to stand, protected by the very laws it has subverted.

Works Cited

Statement submitted by Transparency International, a non-governmental organization in consultative status with the Economic and Social Council – UNODC, https://www.unodc.org/documents/treaties/UNCAC/COSP/session10/NGO/CAC-COSP-2023-NGO48.pdf
UNITED NATIONS CONVENTION AGAINST CORRUPTION – UNODC, https://www.unodc.org/documents/brussels/UN_Convention_Against_Corruption.pdf
TACKLING GRAND CORRUPTION IMPUNITY, https://images.transparencycdn.org/images/Tackling-Grand-Corruption-Impunity-Written-Submission-to-UNCAC-CoSP.pdf
CPI 2023: Corruption and (in)justice – News – Transparency.org, https://www.transparency.org/en/news/cpi-2023-corruption-and-injustice
Statement submitted by Transparency International, a non-governmental organization in consultative status with the Economic and Social Council – Tools and Resources for Anti-Corruption Knowledge – UNODC, https://track.unodc.org/uploads/documents/UNCAC/WorkingGroups/ImplementationReviewGroup/16-20June2025/CAC-COSP-IRG-2025-NGO-5.pdf
The Epstein Files: Shattering the West’s illusion of moral superiority– Beijing Review, https://www.bjreview.com/Opinion/Pacific_Dialogue/202602/t20260210_800430227.html
Epstein files suggest acts that may amount to crimes against humanity, say UN experts, https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2026/feb/18/epstein-files-crimes-against-humanity-un-experts
Tax Havens: Crucibles of financial turmoil and grand corruption, https://www.taxjustice.net/cms/upload/pdf/Hammamet_-_Crucibles_of_Financial_Turmoil_-_JUL-2009-2.pdf
The billions attracted by tax havens do harm to sending and receiving nations alike in: Finance & Development Volume 56 Issue 003 (2019) – IMF eLibrary, https://www.elibrary.imf.org/view/journals/022/0056/003/article-A003-en.xm
The Emerging Idea of an International Anti-Corruption Court – Just Access, https://just-access.de/the-idea-of-an-international-anti-corruption-court/

The Nexus of Impunity and Corruption in Nepal: An Analysis

By Sandeept

On August 3, 2026

In Impunity and Corruption, essay, Opinion

This article is a part of a series on how impunity breeds corruption. The series will begin with Nepal, look at corruption at the global level, and examine why organizations like FATF are ineffective.

Introduction

The relationship between impunity and corruption challenges the stability of governments, the enforcement of rule of law, and the generation of national wealth. When impunity takes hold within the state apparatus, it creates an operational environment where the formal costs and legal risks of engaging in corrupt behaviour are entirely neutralized by those holding power. The deliberate political influence in law, legal institutions, and processes transcends mere bribery and threatens the very fabric of governance, breeding social, political, and economic conflicts.

Web of impunity and corruption in Nepal — Web of Impunity and Corruption in Nepal

In this post…

1. Theoretical Framework of Impunity and Corruption

Scholars define two types of impunity. De facto impunity occurs when the state, despite possessing relevant legal statutes, systematically fails to investigate and prosecute those responsible for legal violations due to a lack of institutional capacity, a deficit of political will, or deeply entrenched political interference.¹ Conversely, de jure impunity arises when a nation’s legal frameworks contain explicit, codified provisions that grant immunity from prosecution, legally shielding political, military, or bureaucratic personnel from any form of accountability.¹

When legal frameworks either lack the necessary enforcement mechanisms to prosecute or are deliberately engineered by the legislature to protect the elite, the resulting culture of impunity severely degrades institutional trust. The impact of such a dynamic is immense. Systemic corruption undermines public confidence in institutional effectiveness and fairness, which are the absolute cornerstones of regime legitimacy.

Theoretical frameworks explore how institutional weaknesses contribute to this nexus. Elinor Ostrom‘s Institutional Analysis and Development (IAD) framework is particularly relevant. Applying the IAD framework to developing democracies reveals how inadequate structures allow political patronage to flourish, as the political landscape often witnesses the favouring of loyal supporters with positions and benefits, thereby superseding public welfare.

Phenomenological interpretations utilizing principal-agent theory, collective action theory, and game theory demonstrate that corrupt behaviour often becomes a normalized “way of life”.² In systems characterized by particularism, where limited public resources are selectively distributed based on political loyalty rather than universal rights, informal norms frequently prevail over the formal rule of law. This creates a clientelist system wherein corruption thrives unchecked, shielded by networks of powerful actors who systematically block any challenges to the status quo.³

2. History of Impunity in Nepal

The pervasive culture of impunity in modern Nepal is not a contemporary aberration but a phenomenon deeply embedded in the nation’s historical, political, and social evolution. The historical roots date back to the Rana regime (1846-1951), the centralized oligarchic system, where the ruling family and high-level administration operated above the law_^.⁴ Financial irregularities committed by the elite supporting the government were almost never investigated, and on the rare occasions they were acknowledged, investigations never resulted in punishments.

This foundational culture of exemption transitioned. This foundational culture of elite exemption transitioned seamlessly into the Panchayat regime, the party-less democratic system that governed Nepal from 1960 until 1990. Politicians aligned with the system were effectively immune to any form of corruption investigation. One of the notable scandals of the era is the “Carpet Scandal” circa 1976, in which the then Prime Minister Tulsi Giri was convicted with 90 other individuals. Four years later, Giri was cleared even though some businessmen got fined.⁵

The transition to a multiparty democracy in 1990 and the subsequent establishment of a federal democratic republic in 2008 following the abolition of the monarchy were hailed as departures from autocratic governance. However, the legacy of impunity proved highly resilient. The pro-Panchayat leaders easily assimilated with or created pro-democracy parties without any investigation into embezzlements or abuse of authority. In the absence of inadequate legal frameworks and insufficient constitutional checks and balances, political parties quickly adopted the practice of protecting their cadres from prosecution. A paradoxical coexistence of democracy and corruption emerged, where the formal institutions of democratic governance exist, but their substance is entirely undermined by weak institutional accountability and systemic political patronage.⁴

Furthermore, Nepal’s ten-year civil war (1996–2006) between Maoist insurgents and state security forces has severely compounded the culture of impunity. During the conflict, human rights violations occurred, including extrajudicial killings, torture, and enforced disappearances.¹ The Comprehensive Peace Agreement of 2006 included explicit commitments to establish a High-Level Truth and Reconciliation Commission to probe these severe violations and ensure accountability.⁶ Yet, for decades, transitional justice has been consistently thwarted through political maneuvering. While over 60,000 individuals have reached out to Nepal’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission and the Commission on Investigation of Disappeared Persons, few cases have been investigated, and none have been completed.⁶

Last year, on September 8, Nepal’s Gen Z came out to protest corruption. Chaos ensued after the protests went violent and the state turned brutal, overturning the government within 27 hours. The nation still awaits justice. Reports, such as those from the Karki Commission and the National Human Rights Commission, have recommended investigation against former prime minister KP Sharma Oli; former home minister Ramesh Lekhak; the then inspector generals of Nepal Police and Armed Police Force; and the head of the National Investigation Department of Nepal.²⁶ Ironically, many names that have been called out as suspicious and requiring further investigations have now become MPs and ministers, turning the demands of rule of law and accountability on their head.

The failure to prosecute well-documented conflict-related crimes has reinforced a societal and institutional understanding that the political elite, whether civilian or military, rarely faces consequences for gross human rights abuses or grand corruption.¹ The Supreme Court has occasionally attempted to intervene, ruling that courts must provide justice and invalidating amnesty provisions, but practical enforcement remains elusive.⁷ As said earlier, in Nepal, both de facto and de jure forms of impunity operate simultaneously, leading to grave violations and utterly undermining faith in the government.¹

3. Legal and Institutional Weaknesses

The Commission for the Investigation of Abuse of Authority (CIAA) and the Special Court are the major anti-corruption institutions in Nepal. Part 21 of the Constitution of Nepal mandates the CIAA to investigate and prosecute corruption among public officials. It was originally established by the 1991 Constitution and continued under subsequent constitutional frameworks. Following the massive political upheavals of 2006, the jurisdiction of the anti-graft efforts was expanded to encompass former judges and military personnel, domains that had previously been strictly insulated from prosecution under the 1991 Constitution.³ However, deliberate loopholes and political influence encourage impunity.

3.1 The “Policy Decision” Loophole

A primary mechanism sustaining de jure impunity in modern Nepal is the so-called “policy decision” loophole, formally codified in Section 4(b) of the CIAA Act of 1991. This legislative provision explicitly states:

The Commission, pursuant to the Act, shall not take any action in matters relating to any business or decisions taken at meetings of any House of Parliament or of any committee or any policy decisions taken by the Council of Ministers or any committee thereof or judicial actions of a court of law.

The law does not allow the CIAA to conduct investigations on any decision made by the members of the parliament, the council of ministers, or the judges. Also, because the law fails to provide a rigorous, restrictive, and legally binding definition of what constitutes a “policy decision,” politicians and bureaucrats routinely exploit this ambiguity. There is a pervasive and growing tendency among policymakers at the federal, provincial, and local levels to elevate routine administrative actions, public procurement contracts, and lucrative resource distributions to the Cabinet level solely to shield them from CIAA scrutiny.⁸

The CIAA itself has decried this tendency, officially requesting an end to the practice of taking issues supposed to be decided by a specific ministry or department directly to the Cabinet.⁸ This deliberate misclassification creates a system where high-level officeholders can indulge in grand corruption with absolute legal immunity, effectively transferring the legal risk away from individual ministers to a collective, unprosecutable body.⁹

A proposed third amendment to the CIAA Act sought to finally narrow the definition of “policy decisions,” explicitly stating that decisions intended to benefit specific individuals or private organizations, or those contrary to publicly announced policies and public procurement laws, cannot be shielded from investigation.¹⁰ However, this provision met fierce resistance from top political leaders, raising deep suspicions regarding the government’s commitment to transparency.¹¹

The Supreme Court of Nepal has wrestled with the limits of prosecutorial discretion and executive immunity. In landmark cases such as Narendra Bahadur Chand v. CIAA (2002), the Supreme Court ruled on the parameters of professional immunity, establishing that while certain officials, like the Attorney General or District Attorneys, enjoy wide discretion in prosecution, decisions made with manifest mala fide intent remain subject to CIAA investigation.¹² Public interest litigations have directly challenged the constitutionality of Section 4(b) of the CIAA Act. Petitioners argue that exempting Cabinet decisions is entirely arbitrary, contrary to the fundamental concept of an ombudsman, and directly promotes corruption by providing high-level officials with an impenetrable shield of immunity.⁹

Further controversy arose in 2024 during the parliamentary discussion of the proposed amendment to the Prevention of Corruption Act (2002). The bill, introduced in 2020, stipulated that “A case must be prosecuted within five years from the date of knowing that such an act has been committed” and extended this protection to retired officials.¹³ It was widely criticized by legal experts, civil society, and opposition parties (including the RSP and sections of the NC) as a deliberate, calculated attempt to grant permanent retroactive amnesty to politicians involved in massive historical scams. Following massive public outcry and resistance within the State Affairs and Good Governance Committee, the statute of limitations provision was removed from the proposed bill.¹⁴

3.2 Disparities in Perception of Corruption and Anti-Corruption Enforcement

The Corruption Perceptions Index (CPI), published annually by Transparency International, is the primary, most universally recognized metric for evaluating public sector corruption globally. The CPI aggregates governance-related data from numerous independent international organizations, including the World Bank, the World Economic Forum, the Bertelsmann Foundation, and the World Justice Project, to score countries on a scale from 0 (highly corrupt) to 100 (very clean).¹⁵

Data show Nepal’s performance in controlling corruption has shown absolutely no meaningful improvement.¹⁵ A CPI score consistently hovering around 34 indicates a profound, multi-generational failure of the state machinery to implement effective anti-corruption measures, placing Nepal firmly in the lower tier of the global index and categorizing it among nations with highly corrupt public sectors (any score below 50).

The Transparency International report further highlights the immense disconnect between the government and the populace, revealing that an overwhelming 84 percent of Nepalis perceive government corruption as a massive national problem, with 12 percent of public service users explicitly admitting to having paid a bribe within the previous twelve months just to access basic rights.¹⁵ The Rule of Law Index, compiled by the World Justice Project, mirrors these severe concerns.

While legislative struggles and CPI indicate troubles in anti-corruption measures, an examination of the Special Court’s historical data reveals a stark and troubling disparity. These underscore a profound tendency to prosecute low-level administrative fraud while high-level systemic embezzlement remains virtually untouched.

Although the data is old, the trend has not changed much. It demonstrates a clear, undeniable pattern: the overwhelming majority of successful convictions relate to relatively minor, easily provable offenses, such as the forgery of fake government certificates. Conversely, complex cases involving unexplained wealth (illicit enrichment), massive public procurement fraud, and high-level bribery exhibit significantly lower conviction rates and constitute a disproportionately small fraction of the total judicial docket.

This statistical reality reflects a broader institutional culture where the CIAA frequently focuses its limited resources on “sting operations” targeting lower-level civil servants, while complex, high-value scandals orchestrated by the political elite remain paralyzed by legal loopholes, intense political interference, and an overarching culture of de facto impunity.¹⁶ Over 60 percent of corrupt activities fall entirely outside the practical scope of the law, and the criminal justice system is heavily affected by delays that further undermine deterrence.¹⁶

3.3 Institutional Capture through Political Appointments

As we discussed in the article: 7 Constitutional Loopholes and Provisions that Give Superpower to Political Parties in Nepal, political parties have an exceptional influence over political appointments. Such a deeply entrenched “Bhagbanda” system has established a political culture of aggressive quota sharing and factional negotiation among the major political parties. Rather than appointing individuals based on merit, integrity, and professional competence, political parties divide key constitutional and judicial appointments among themselves to ensure mutual protection and to maintain total influence over the state apparatus.

7 Constitutional Loopholes and Provisions that Give Superpower to Political Parties in Nepal

Consequently, the CIAA is frequently staffed by former bureaucrats who maintain deep, ongoing loyalties to the specific political leaders or parties that successfully facilitated their appointments.¹⁷ This fundamentally compromises the CIAA’s ability to act as an independent ombudsman. The general public often predicts which party’s quota an appointment fulfills, completely undermining the institution’s credibility.¹⁷

This mechanism of political capture extends deeply and destructively into the judiciary. Although the Constitution of Nepal envisions an independent judiciary, free from the legislative and executive branches, the Judicial Council, which recommends the appointment of judges, is heavily influenced, if not entirely dominated, by political interests.¹⁸ The politicization of judicial appointments has severely eroded the competency, impartiality, and integrity of the courts. Judges appointed through the Bhagbanda system are widely perceived as beholden to political parties, leading to court verdicts that appear heavily influenced by political pressure rather than legal merit.

Legal experts point to the events of 2013 as a major turning point, when then-Chief Justice Khil Raj Regmi was appointed as the chairman of the Council of Ministers (effectively the Prime Minister) to oversee elections.¹⁸ This extraordinary merging of the executive and judicial branches laid the foundation for the profound political exploitation of the judiciary. The Nepal Bar Association has repeatedly highlighted that corruption is deeply rooted within the judicial system, particularly in courts of first instance, where bribes and unethical conduct by legal professionals further subvert justice.⁷

The systemic corruption within the judiciary was officially acknowledged by a Supreme Court-commissioned task force led by former Chief Justice Hari Krishna Karki. To combat rampant irregularities, undue influence, and corruption within the judicial process, the panel recommended reforms such as the adoption of an automated lottery system for assigning cases to justices, replacing the traditional system where the Chief Justice had the discretionary power to assign benches—a practice ripe for manipulation and executive interference.¹⁹ While the Supreme Court recently constituted a task force to implement these recommendations under Chief Justice Prakash Man Singh Raut, the delayed implementation of these reforms underscores the immense resistance from entrenched interests seeking to preserve a pliable, politically responsive judiciary.

4. High-Profile Case Studies of Systemic Corruption

4.1 The Fake Bhutanese Refugee Scam

The Fake Bhutanese Refugee Scam stands as one of the most notorious, internationally embarrassing examples of systemic state capture, fraud, and human trafficking orchestrated by the Nepalese political elite. In this highly complex fraud scheme, a political-bureaucratic syndicate colluded to extort millions of rupees from over 875 Nepali citizens. The victims paid massive sums ranging from Rs 1 million to Rs 5 million under the false promise of being supplied with fabricated credentials identifying them as Bhutanese refugees eligible for highly sought-after third-country resettlement, primarily to the United States.²⁰

This scam stems from the real problem of Bhutanese refugees in Nepal. Between 1990 and 1993, many Nepali-speaking Bhutanese were expelled from Bhutan, taking refuge in camps in eastern Nepal. Between 2007 and the conclusion of the resettlement program, the United Nations High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR) successfully resettled over 113,000 genuine Bhutanese refugees from these camps to Western countries, with the US alone taking over 90,000. The racketeers exploited the residual administrative infrastructure and international goodwill of this massive humanitarian effort for pure private financial gain.²⁰

The scandal resulted in the arrests of exceptionally high-ranking officials, including former Deputy Prime Minister Top Bahadur Rayamajhi, former Home Minister Bal Krishna Khand, former Home Secretary Tek Narayan Pandey, and Indrajeet Rai (security advisor to the former home minister).²⁰ The District Attorney Office in Kathmandu filed criminal cases against 30 individuals, indicting them on severe charges of treason, organized crime, fraud, and forgery, specifically seeking aggravated penalties for the public officials involved due to their abuse of office. The involvement of such high-level figures outraged the society and drew deep international concern, with rampant speculations that the US Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) was monitoring the probe due to the implications for US immigration security.

Top Bahadur Rayamajhi (Left) and Balkrishna Khand (Right)

Despite the unprecedented nature of these arrests, the specter of impunity remained prominent. On July 14, 2026, the Kathmandu District Court gave its final verdict in the case.²⁰ The punishments to the convicts, however, look meagre in comparison to the crimes related to document forgery, organized crime, and crime against the state. For instance, Top Bahadur Rayamajhi has been sentenced to 4 years in prison and a fine of Rs. 40,000, and Balkrishna Khand will serve 1 year in prison and pay a fine of Rs. 15,000.

4.2 The Lalita Niwas Land Grab

The Lalita Niwas scam perfectly exemplifies the exploitation of the “policy decision” loophole to orchestrate the mass privatization of prime state assets. The case revolves around the unauthorized and systematic transfer of highly valuable government-owned land in Baluwatar, Kathmandu—situated adjacent to the official residence of the Prime Minister, the Nepal Rastra Bank, and several VVIP addresses—to private individuals and corporate entities.²¹ Key figures implicated included Min Bahadur Gurung, the proprietor of Bhatbhateni Supermarket, and former election commissioner Sudhir Shah.²¹

The land transfer was facilitated through a highly organized scheme utilizing fraudulent documents, phony government stamps, and, crucially, executive approvals obtained directly through the Council of Ministers.²¹ Initially, the CIAA utilized the provision of Section 4(b) of the CIAA Act to exempt former Prime Ministers Madhav Kumar Nepal and Baburam Bhattarai from prosecution, arguing that their executive directives to transfer the land constituted collective “policy decisions” strictly beyond the commission’s jurisdiction. Instead, the anti-graft body filed corruption charges against subordinate ministers who implemented the directives, such as Bijay Kumar Gachchhadar (Minister for Physical Infrastructure) and Chandra Dev Joshi (Minister for Land Reform).²²

However, the Supreme Court mandated that the top decision-makers who facilitated the transfer process via the Cabinet must also be subjected to criminal investigation, challenging the absolute immunity historically granted to Prime Ministerial decrees. Consequently, the Central Investigation Bureau (CIB) recorded formal statements from both former Prime Ministers, setting a new precedent for accountability.²¹ Despite this, the ultimate resolution of the Lalita Niwas cases remains a critical litmus test for the Nepali state’s capacity to dismantle high-level impunity. Ongoing legal maneuvers continue to determine whether the land will be fully returned to the government and whether all involved actors, including judges and relatives of prominent politicians like Arju Rana Deuba, will face supplementary charge sheets.²³

4.3 A Legacy of Unpunished Financial Irregularities

The Fake Bhutanese Refugee and Lalita Niwas scandals are not isolated anomalies but represent the apex of a sustained historical trend of unpunished resource extraction across virtually all sectors of the Nepali economy.

Major Corruption Scandal	Estimated Financial Scale / Loss	Status / Implicated Entities
Lalita Niwas Land Grab	~ Rs. 13 billion	Former PMs, Ministers, Private Developers
False VAT Bill Scandal	~ Rs. 10 billion	Private sector, Revenue Administration
Widebody Aircraft Purchase	~ Rs. 4.3 billion	Ministry of Tourism, Nepal Airlines Corporation (NAC)
Illegal Fees in Medical Colleges	~ Rs. 3 billion	Educational Institutions, Regulatory Bodies
Security Printing Press	~ Rs. 3 billion	Ministry of Communication
38 Quintal Gold Smuggling	~ Rs. 1.5 billion	Customs, High-ranking Police Officials
Pokhara International Airport	~ Rs. 461.5 million	CAAN officials, Foreign Consultants
Lauda Air Lease Scandal	~ Rs. 380 million	High-level politicians (historically unpunished)

Table: Major corruption scandals in Nepal

In the recent case of the Chinese-funded Pokhara International Airport, the CIAA filed charges in the Special Court against 21 individuals, including two Chinese officials, for the gross misappropriation of consulting funds. The officials directly bypassed the Engineering, Procurement, and Construction (EPC) contract terms, transferring an allocated $2.8 million to an unapproved joint venture (ERMC/Anot/Slate JV), resulting in hundreds of millions of rupees lost in a single transaction.²⁴

In earlier foundational cases, such as the Lauda Air scandal, the leasing of aircraft without formal bidding caused immense losses to the national flag carrier (Rs. 380 million), yet high-level leaders like Girija Prasad Koirala entirely evaded accountability.¹⁶ Similarly, the procurement of Widebody aircraft involved massive irregularities that led to the conviction of lower-tier officials like former Finance Secretary Shishir Kumar Dhungana, who was sentenced to prison and heavily fined (Rs 120 million), while the overarching political architects who approved the funding remained relatively untouched.²⁵

These compounding scandals unequivocally demonstrate that public funds in Nepal are systematically siphoned into private hands through complex, politically protected mechanisms, stifling national development and perpetuating deep economic fragility.¹⁶

5. Socio-Economic Impacts

The economic cost of systemic corruption in Nepal extends far beyond the immediate, quantifiable financial losses detailed in high-profile scandals. At a macroeconomic level, widespread corruption, coupled with political instability, acts as a severe deterrent to both domestic capital formation and foreign direct investment.²⁷ This fundamentally limits the state’s productive capacity, ensuring it remains trapped in a low-growth equilibrium. The illicit diversion of resources away from productive uses critically reduces the efficacy of public policies designed to alleviate poverty and construct essential national infrastructure.²⁸

Empirical research on Nepal’s economic trajectory emphasizes that the quality of governance is directly correlated with economic output.²⁷ Mathematical assessments confirm that approximately 92 percent of GDP growth volatility in Nepal can be explained by fluctuations in infrastructure investment, political stability, monetary freedom, and the effectiveness of anti-corruption measures.²⁷ When the state is completely captured by rent-seeking elites, funds that should be allocated for critical development projects are absorbed by the informal economy, perpetuating a cycle of underdevelopment and socio-economic inequality.¹⁶ The Gini coefficient for Nepal, historically recorded around 30, reflects this deep structural maldistribution of wealth exacerbated by corrupt governance.⁷

On a microeconomic level, the lived experience of ordinary Nepali citizens interacting with the state apparatus is fundamentally defined by the necessity of navigating corruption. Due to a highly complicated bureaucracy characterized by redundant documentation, intentionally opaque procedures, and a total lack of transparency, a vast informal economy of bribery has become normalized at the grassroots level.² Businesses and citizens rely heavily on these informal payments simply to function, fully aware that such behavior actively damages the institutional fabric. This dynamic leads to intense, simmering public discontent regarding the government’s ability to deliver services efficiently, eroding the social contract between the state and the citizen.²

The burden of the systemic corruption falls disproportionately upon the poorest, most vulnerable, and most marginalized segments of society. Corruption relating to the illegal exploitation of land, forestry, and water resources often leads directly to environmental degradation and the dispossession of indigenous territories. Because these communities lack the financial means to participate in the pervasive bribery culture to secure their rights and are historically vastly underrepresented in the civil service and political leadership, they are systematically excluded from the benefits of state resources.²⁹ Illicit financial flows driven by corruption erode the domestic tax base and dramatically worsen inequality, increasing Nepal’s dependence on official development assistance while actively stalling vital poverty reduction initiatives.

The culmination of this massive economic despair, compounded by unabated impunity, has manifested in significant socio-political unrest and violence. When structural corruption leaves the state unable to generate employment or manage inflation, the youth demographic—comprising over 60 percent of the population, with youth unemployment exceeding a staggering 20 percent—experiences profound disenfranchisement.³⁰ This volatile economic reality ignited the massive Gen Z-led protests that swept Kathmandu and other regions in September 2025 and continued into early 2026.

Transparency International Nepal explicitly validated this connection, stating that the immense public frustration and the Gen Z protests were directly driven by corruption, the abuse of power by political leadership, and the systematic exclusion of young people from employment, economic opportunities, and accessible public services.⁵⁷ This pattern aligns with broader regional instability seen in Bangladesh and Sri Lanka, proving that economic grievances born of corruption invariably translate into catastrophic political instability.

6. Conclusion

The intricate, symbiotic relationship between impunity and corruption in Nepal represents a severe, self-sustaining crisis of governance that threatens the foundational stability of the democratic state. As this analysis has demonstrated, corruption in the nation is not merely a collection of isolated transactional bribes; it is a deeply entrenched systemic condition facilitated by the continuous, deliberate subversion of the rule of law by the political elite. The historical legacy of autocratic regimes established a powerful precedent of elite exemption that has seamlessly adapted to the structures of the modern federal democratic republic.

Resilience is maintained through carefully engineered legal vulnerabilities and institutional capture. The “policy decision” loophole within the CIAA Act allows the executive branch to legally shield massive financial irregularities, such as the Lalita Niwas land grab and multi-billion rupee procurement frauds, under the guise of collective Cabinet immunity.

Simultaneously, the Bhagbanda system ensures that the very institutions explicitly designed to enforce accountability, the CIAA, the judiciary, and others, are thoroughly captured through partisan appointments. When the investigative and judicial apparatuses are populated by individuals beholden to political patrons, the resulting de facto impunity ensures that only low-level bureaucratic infractions are prosecuted. Meanwhile, monumental state-capture schemes, like the Fake Bhutanese Refugee scam, are perpetually plagued by delays, selective prosecution, and blatant executive interference.

The macroeconomic and social costs of this impunity are catastrophic. It diverts vital infrastructure funding, stifles foreign direct investment, and exacerbates inequality, disproportionately harming marginalized Indigenous and Dalit communities whose resources are relentlessly exploited. The absolute normalization of bribery in essential public service delivery alienates the citizenry and fundamentally undermines the legitimacy of the state. As empirical metrics from Transparency International consistently indicate, the state’s total failure to improve its corruption indices directly validates the immense economic despair that drives explosive public unrest, including the violent Gen Z protests that rocked the nation in late 2025 and early 2026.

Dismantling this deeply rooted culture requires interventions that target the structural enablers of impunity. To alter the current trajectory, the political consensus that protects high-level offenders must be dismantled by ensuring the absolute independence of the judiciary and anti-corruption commissions, completely free from the quota-sharing mechanisms of political parties. Legal loopholes, particularly the broad exemptions for Cabinet policy decisions, must be aggressively restricted through clear, limiting legislation. Any attempts by the legislature to introduce statutes of limitation for grand corruption must be permanently abandoned.

Without the full, impartial enforcement of the law, equal accountability for the topmost political leadership, and the robust protection of civil society oversight, the nexus of impunity and corruption will continue to cripple Nepal’s trajectory toward sustainable economic development and democratic integrity.

Works cited

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Why can’t CIAA probe Cabinet decisions, asks apex court – The Himalayan Times, https://thehimalayantimes.com/nepal/why-cant-ciaa-probe-cabinet-decisions-asks-apex-court
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Anti-corruption and CIAA Bills: Five Years together, now divided – Onlinekhabar English, https://english.onlinekhabar.com/anti-corruption-and-ciaa-bills-five-years-together-now-divided.html
Authority without accountability: The struggle for justice in Nepal, https://www.icj.org/wp-content/uploads/2013/10/ICJ-AUTHORITY-WITHOUT-ACCOUNTABILITY-final-1.pdf
A proposal for a law that would limit corruption to only five years, Kantipur, https://ekantipur.com/en/news/2024/08/12/a-proposal-for-a-law-that-would-limit-corruption-to-only-five-years-08-50.html
House committee agrees to remove 5-year statute of limitations from corruption-related bill, accessed March 25, 2026, https://en.setopati.com/political/163599
Nepal – Transparency.org https://www.transparency.org/en/countries/nepal
HISTORICAL ROOTS OF IMPUNITY AND CORRUPTION 95 A peer-reviewed open-access journal indexed in NepJol ISSN 2990-7640 (online); I https://nepjol.info/index.php/mef/article/download/73940/56607/214769
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Politicization of Nepal’s judiciary is entrenched | The Annapurna Express, https://theannapurnaexpress.com/story/49209/
Supreme Court to implement Karki panel’s report on judicial reform – The Kathmandu Post, https://kathmandupost.com/national/2024/10/24/supreme-court-to-implement-karki-panel-s-report-on-judicial-reform
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Lalita Niwas scam probe: People have every right to know uncensored truth, https://theannapurnaexpress.com/story/45523/
Three cases related to Lalita Niwas land scam scheduled for hearing today, https://english.ratopati.com/story/38548
Lalita Niwas to Lichibagan: Always a curve on government land – Kantipur, https://ekantipur.com/koseli/2025/10/11/en/lalita-niwas-to-lichibagan-always-a-curve-on-government-land-53-16.html
Third graft case filed over China-funded Pokhara airport, 21 charged – Asia News Network, https://asianews.network/third-graft-case-filed-over-china-funded-pokhara-airport-21-charged/
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देश सिध्याउने दलालहरुको नाममा !

By Sandeept

On October 23, 2023

In Blogging, Humanity, Humans and Humanity, Nepal, Nepali, Public Interest, Writing, नेपाली

“एसियाको सबभन्दा गरीब देशको नागरिक भएकोमा बधाई छ !” फेसबुकमा देखियो । केही छिन पछि अर्को पोस्टमा भेटिएको थियो, “International Monetary Fund (IMF) ले सार्वजनिक गरेको प्रतिवेदनले नेपाललाई एसियाकै सबैभन्दा गरीब देश भनेको छ ।” IMF ले २०२३ अक्टोबरको “World Economic Outlook” निकालेको छ भन्ने कुरा गूगल सर्चबाट थाहा भयो । प्रतिवेदन सर्सर्ती हेर्दा त्यस्तो लेखिएको कतै भेटिन्न ! “Find” tool प्रयोग गरेर poor keyword खोज्दा पनि सिधै कुनै देशलाई धनी भनेकै छैन ! अलमल्ल परें । ५-६ घण्टापछि ट्विटर (सरी, X) मा FACTS ले राखेको एउटा ग्राफ भेटेँ । त्यसमा हरेक महादेशका सबभन्दा गरीब देशहरू थिए । स्रोत थियो अप्रिलको World Economic Outlook । त्यसमा पनि खोजें । खोजेको कुरा पाइनँ । फेरि गूगलमा खोज्दा चाहिँ एउटा लिङ्क भेटियो । Global Finance Magazine को त्यो पेजमा FACTS ले राखेका देशहरूको सूची थियो । त्यस पत्रिकाले IMF कै अप्रिलको प्रतिवेदनको आधारमा गरीब देशहरूको सूची तयार गरेको रहेछ । यमन र अफगनिस्तान जस्ता युद्धपीडित देशहरूलाई नराख्दा नेपाल एसियाको सबैभन्दा गरीबमध्येकै देश रहेछ । (IMF को interactive page यता हेर्नुहोला ।) हुन त गरीबीको मापन गर्न प्रयोग गरिएका index हरूमा केही समस्या छन् भनेर IMF ले नै भनेको छ तर हामी धनले त गरीब भयौँ नै, सोचले समेत दरिद्र छौँ । यसमा कुनै शङ्का नगरे हुन्छ !

यति हुँदा पनि हाम्रा शासक, प्रशासक, कर्मचारी र अलिकति पनि शक्ति हुने जोसुकैलाई भने लज्जाबोध छैन । यी र केही “जान्नेसुन्ने” मानिसहरूको तर्क कस्तो हुन्छ भने, “राजाको शासनमा कहाँ अहिले जस्तो थियो ? अहिले त्यो बेला भन्दा धेरै राम्रो छ ! जनताले बोल्न पाएका छन् ! राजाको पालामा राजदरबार नजिकका मान्छेसँग मात्रै धन थियो । अहिले जोसुकैलाई कमाउने मौका छ । त्यसैले, पहिलेभन्दा धनी छन् त जनता !”

समयको क्रमसँगै आफैं हुने परिवर्तनमै रमाउने यी वर्ग देशमा कुनै समस्या नै देख्दैनन् । समस्या नदेखे पछि समाधान गर्नै परेन ! समस्या किन देखिँदैन भने यिनको आँखामा पट्टी बाँधिएको छ–सत्ता, शक्ति र सम्पत्तिको । सत्ता, शक्ति र सम्पत्ति आर्जन मात्रै उद्देश्य भएपछि मानिस भ्रष्ट बन्छ । धर्म र कर्तव्य के हो भन्ने बिर्सिएका यिनीहरूले सहीलाई झुठ र गलतलाई सही बनाइदिन्छन् । असल मानिसहरूलाई यिनीहरू आफ्नो वशमा पार्न खोज्छन् ताकि आफूजस्तै बनाउन सकियोस् । अरूलाई दोषी देख्ने यिनका आँखाले आफूलाई भने असल देखाउन खोज्छन् । यसरी अधर्म फैलिन्छ हरेकको मनमा । मेरो देश यस्तै अधर्मीले भरिएको रहेछ । ज्ञान, विज्ञान र धर्म लत्याउने गतिछाडा दलालहरूले भरिएको देश गरीब नभए के हुन्छ ?

ए शासक, प्रशासक, कर्मचारी, व्यापारी र थोरै मात्रै पनि शक्ति पाउने वित्तिकै मैमत्त हुनेहरू ! तिमीहरूको धर्म के हो ? देशमा बनेका कानून, नीति, नियमलाई सत्कर्मका साथ पालना गरेर जनकल्याण गर्नु हैन ? देशको हित हुँदा तिमीहरूको हित हुने हैन ? सत्ता, शक्ति र सम्पत्तिको लागि जे पनि गर्ने ? अनेक सुविधा लिने अनि कसैको स्वार्थ पूरा गर्न घुस, गिफ्ट, दान लिने ? कानूनको धज्जी उडाउने अनि हास्दै हिँडने ? लाज पचाएर अझै एक अर्कालाई गाली गरेर आम जनतालाई भ्रमित पार्ने ? अनि मिलेमतो गर्न पायो भने चै जे पनि गर्ने ?

तिमीहरूले आफ्नो आत्मा त बेच्यौ नै, मान्छे पनि बेच्छौ । तिमीहरू यति मूर्ख छौ कि तिमीहरूलाई लाग्छ आफ्ना आफन्तहरू तिमीले बेचेका छैनौ । तर तिमीहरूका सन्तानहरू अहिले कहाँ छन् ? के गर्दैछन् ? तिमीहरूका साथमा छन् ? साथमा भएकाहरू कुन स्वार्थका लागि बसेका छन् ? मनैदेखि कर्तव्य वुझेर स्याहार सुसार गर्छन् ? तिमीहरूका कुरा मान्छन् ? यहाँ करोडौंको धनसम्पत्ति भए पनि तिमीहरूका सन्तान किन विदेशमा दुःख गर्न खोज्छन् ? सोचेका छौ कहिले ? सोच्ने भए गति किन छाड्थ्यौ होला र ?

ल सुन ! तिमीहरूका सन्तान तिमीसँग छैनन् किनकी उनीहरूलाई (प्रत्यक्ष नभए उनीहरूको ब्रह्मलाई थाहा छ) त्यो धन सत्यको हैन । तिमीहरू ज्ञानलाई दुत्कार्छौ, तिमीहरूका सन्तान अनैतिक बन्दै जान्छन् । तिमी विज्ञानको उपहास गर्छौ, तिमीहरूका सन्तानले यहाँ अवसर गुमाउँछन् । तिमीहरू अधर्म गर्छौ, तिमीहरूका सन्तान टाढिँदै जान्छन् । तिमीहरू दुष्कर्म गर्छौ अनि परिणाम राम्रो हुन्छ ? वर्षौं “मिहिनेत” गरेर कमाएको तिमीहरूका घरमा तिमीहरू किन एक्ला छौ ? तिम्रै कुकर्मको फल हैन ? एउटा पुस्ताले गरेको कुकर्मले आउने सन्तानहरूलाई कतिसम्म पिर्छ भन्ने त थाहा छ त तिमीहरूलाई ! महाभारत बिर्स्यौ ?

हुन त तिमीहरू महाभारत (र अरू शास्त्र) लाई फगत कहानी मान्छौ । त्यहाँ भएका सत्कर्मका उपदेश तिमीहरूलाई विष लाग्छ । तर मस्तिष्कको कुनामा कतै स्वविवेक भएको भए तिमी देख्थ्यौ कसरी इन्द्रीयलाई वशमा राख्न नसकेका शान्तनुले गर्दा उनका राजा हुन योग्य छाेरा राजा बन्न पाएनन् । राजगद्दीप्रति सधैँ वफादार हुन खोज्दा भीष्म, द्रोण र कृपाचार्यले अधर्मका विरुद्ध बोल्न सकेनन् । विभिन्न पात्रका कुकर्म, द्वेष र महत्त्वाकांक्षाले भएको युद्धमा शान्तनुका सन्तान मात्रै नासिएनन्, लगभग पूरै भारतवर्षको विनाश भयो । तिमीहरू पनि एउटा सभ्यता विनाश गर्दैछौ । तिमीहरूले नपाएर मात्रै हो, पाउने भए यो देश उहिल्यै बेचिसक्थ्यौ । र त बेलाबेला भन्छौ, “नेपाल भारत, चीन, वा अरू कुनै देशमा विलय भएको भए नि हुन्थ्यो !” कुलाङ्घारहरू !

दशैंकाे बेला छ । वर्षभरिको “दुःखकाे फल” भित्र्याउने समय यही हो भन्दै सेवाग्राहीसँग खुल्लम खुल्ला रकम माग्ने सरकारी कर्मचारीदेखि दशैंका नाममा बढी पैसा उठाउने पसले, होटेल र गाडी साहुहरू सबै चोर हौ । तैपनि नैतिकता नभएका तिमीहरू खुब मजाले आशीर्वाद दिन्छौ सन्तानलाई, “ज्ञानी हुनू, ठूलो मान्छे हुनू, सबैले मान्ने हुनू !” अनि तिम्रा कर्म चै के हो ? छोराछोरीका आँखामा हेरेर आदर्शका गफ गर्न कसरी सक्छौ ? कति सम्म चैं किच्चक हौ ?

तिमीहरूलाई यहाँ कसले मान्छ ? तिमीहरूमा न ज्ञान छ न विज्ञान मान्छौ न त धर्म । जो तिमीहरूलाई नमस्ते गर्दै आउँछ नि, तिमीहरूलाई सम्मान गर्न हैन, कि त तिमीहरूबाट काम लिन आउँछ कि त बाध्यताले । जसको मुखमा एउटा अनि मनमा अर्को कुरा हुन्छ, त्यस्तो मानिसको सङ्गत गर्नु तरबारको धारमा हिँड्नु बराबर हो भनेर शास्त्रले पनि भन्छ । तिमीहरूको सङ्गत गर्यो भने साधु पनि कि त चोर बन्छ कि त शुलीमा चढ्छ ।

हुन त तिमीहरू बेलगाम घोडा हौ । तिमीहरूलाई शास्त्र व्यर्थ लाग्छ, अर्ती गाली लाग्छ, कानून, विधि र विज्ञान बोझ लाग्छ तर तिमीहरूका सन्तान त तिमीहरूलाई आफ्नै लाग्छ नि हैन ? मरेर जाँदा तिमीहरूले लाने केही हैन, सबै कुरा छोडरै जान्छौ । सुकर्म छाड्यौ भने तिम्रा सन्तान पनि खुशी हुन्छन् तर कुकर्मले तिनलाई पनि सुख दिँदैन । कमसेकम तिनका लागि त केही सत्कर्म गर !

धनभन्दा माथि देश हो अनि देशभन्दा माथि धर्म ! यति बुझ्ने यहाँ कोही देख्दिन । देश राजनीतिले खत्तम भएको हैन, कुनीति र कुनियतले हो । राजनीति भनेको त राजा (इन्द्रीय र लोकभन्दा माथि हुने) को नीति अनि नीतिको राजा हो । नीतिको जग नैतिकतामा हुन्छ जुन हामी नेपालीमा छँदै छैन । उज्वल थापाले भनेझैं एकले अर्कोलाई पाएसम्म लुट्न तयार छौं हामी । यो लुटको चक्रव्यूह तोड्न सक्ने अर्जुनलाई यहाँ युद्धभूमिबाट लखेटिन्छ । केही गरौँ भन्ने अभिमन्युजस्ता जोशिला तर अनुभव कम भएका युवाहरूलाई चक्रव्यूहमा फसाएर मारिन्छ । शकुनि र दुर्योधनको राज छ यहाँ । भीष्म र द्रोणहरू लाचार भई दुष्टहरूको साथ दिइरहेका छन् । यो सब देखेर दिक्क भएका मानिसहरू देश छोडिरहेका छन् । म तिमीहरूका सब कर्तुत निराश भएर हेर्दै भन्दै छु, “यो देश उँभो लाग्ने छाँट छैन ।”

र, यति निराश म कहिले पनि भएको थिइनँ ।

Tag: corruption

FATF Greylist: A Trap against the Global South

Articles in this Series

In this post…

1. The Blacklist and the Greylist

1.1 The Blacklist: High-Risk Jurisdictions Subject to a Call for Action

1.2 The Greylist: Jurisdictions Under Increased Monitoring

2. The Double Standard

3. Consequences of Greylisting on Developing and LDCs

3.1 Capital Flight and FDI Contraction

3.2 Economic Cascades

3.3 De-Risking and the Collapse of Correspondent Banking

3.3.1 De-risking and correspondent banking

3.3.2 Compliance vs. Profitability

3.3.3 The Paradox

3.4 Geopolitical Implications

3.4.1 The Oligarchy of Standard-Setting

3.4.2 Weaponization of Compliance

3.4.3 Other Implications

4. Case Studies

4.1 The Macroeconomic Decimation of Pakistan (2008-2019)

4.2 Economic Crisis in Nepal

5. Conclusion

Works Cited

Corruption, Impunity, and Conflict: Insights on How Corruption Triggers War

Articles in this series

In this post…

Why Corruption transforms into Violence

How Embezzlement Kills Before the First Shot is Fired

State Capture

Lessons from Nepal: Why “Peace Agreements” Don’t Diffuse Conflict

Conclusion

Works Cited

The Architecture of Global Impunity: 5 Reasons the World’s Biggest Thieves Almost Never Go to Jail

Articles in this series

Enablers of Global Impunity and Corruption:

Enablers of Global Impunity and Corruption

1. Grand Corruption, Kleptocracy, Chumocracy, and State Capture

2. Weaponization of the Justice System

3. Gilded Criminals hiding in Plain Sight

4. Global Transnational Enabler Ecosystem

5. The Enforcement Vacuum of Global Treaties

Examples of Elite Protection and Global Impunity

1. The Epstein Case

2. Sovereign Bond Misappropriation (Malaysia and Mozambique)

3. Developed Democracies as Global Tax Havens

Proposed Solution: The International Anti-Corruption Court

Conclusion

Works Cited

The Nexus of Impunity and Corruption in Nepal: An Analysis

Introduction

In this post…

1. Theoretical Framework of Impunity and Corruption

2. History of Impunity in Nepal

3. Legal and Institutional Weaknesses

3.1 The “Policy Decision” Loophole

3.2 Disparities in Perception of Corruption and Anti-Corruption Enforcement

3.3 Institutional Capture through Political Appointments

4. High-Profile Case Studies of Systemic Corruption

4.1 The Fake Bhutanese Refugee Scam

4.2 The Lalita Niwas Land Grab

4.3 A Legacy of Unpunished Financial Irregularities

5. Socio-Economic Impacts

6. Conclusion

Works cited

देश सिध्याउने दलालहरुको नाममा !

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