Rule of Law

Last June, Mexico elected new governors in twelve of its thirty-one states. As millions of voters went to the urns, corruption was a top concern (along with insecurity). Eight states saw the incumbent party kicked out; in four—Veracruz, Quintana Roo, Chihuahua, and Durango—the PRI lost for the first time in the party’s history. The voter outrage behind this rout seems to be rooted in reality. Seven of the outgoing governors face serious corruption allegations; in five of these investigations are already underway, either by the Mexican or U.S. government. Here is a rundown of their alleged misdeeds: The most egregious accusations surround the outgoing PRI governors of Veracruz, Quintana Roo, and Chihuahua. In Veracruz, still Governor Javier Duarte (PRI) is being investigated by Mexico’s attorney general’s office (PGR) for embezzlement and illicit enrichment. News reports count at least 646 million pesos—roughly $48 million dollars—in government contracts to phantom companies. In response the PRI has distanced itself, taking away Duarte’s party privileges. Quintana Roo’s former Governor Roberto Borge (PRI) is under investigation by Mexico’s tax authority (SAT) following a CNN exposé alleging that he led a vast fraud ring, systematically robbing individuals’ and businesses’ real estate and bank accounts. In just one day, authorities took over four hotels worth 340 million pesos. Televisa journalists also uncovered sales of protected lands to Borge’s friends on the cheap, and his use of public money to fund his own personal airline. In Chihuahua, the PGR is investigating former Governor César Duarte (PRI) for illicit enrichment and money laundering, based on allegations that he directed 80 billion pesos in public funds into a bank he partially owned. He is also facing a lawsuit from a Spanish corporation for trying to use public funds to pay off $2 million of a $4 million dollar personal debt. All three governors attempted to protect themselves against prosecutions before stepping down, setting up ahead-of-schedule state-level anticorruption offices and then packing them with their cronies. So far, the Supreme Court has struck down both Duartes’ actions, and Borge’s case is pending. In Zacatecas, former Governor Miguel Alonso (PRI) is being investigated by the PGR for embezzlement and illicit enrichment for buying protected land before it was rezoned for residential or commercial use. Local legislators also accuse him of receiving kickbacks for government contracts—paid to his brother Juan Manuel Alonso. In Oaxaca, outgoing Governor Gabino Cué (PAN) is under investigation by U.S. authorities for possible money laundering, following the movement of tens of millions of dollars through the bank accounts of his close associates. In Hidalgo, the press uncovered that former Governor Francisco Olvera (PRI) spent hundreds of thousands of pesos to attend the Super Bowl and bring chart-topping musicians to play at his private parties, all supposedly on his governor’s salary. He also used his government helicopter for personal fun, including going to a soccer game. Finally in Aguascalientes, news exposés accuse outgoing Governor Carlos Lozano (PRI) of nepotism, maneuvering his nephew into control of the state’s finances. Those ending their tenure in the remaining five states have not yet been accused of illegal financial dealings, though rumors of using public funds for self-promotion, ties to drug cartels, and missing financial documents swirl around many of them. This corruption—part of the morass that costs the Mexican economy up to 10 percent of GDP each year—motivated voters last summer. It is time now for the judicial branch to step forward and play its democratic role—investigating, prosecuting, and convicting the guilty.

Bochen Han is an intern for Asia Studies at the Council on Foreign Relations. Driving through any Chinese city, town, or village today it’s hard to miss the 24-character set of “core socialist values” (shehuizhuyi hexin jiazhiguan) that adorn almost every public surface—restaurant menus, billboards, taxi cabs. In Urumqi, capital of the Xinjiang Uyghur Autonomous Region, schoolchildren must recite them on demand. In Chaohu city in Anhui province, citizens were encouraged to hang values-inscribed lanterns for the Spring Festival. Southwest, in Sichuan province, officials popularized the values by including them in riddles. This idealistic set of twelve “core socialist values” was first defined at the 18th National Congress in 2012, and again highlighted in the annual meetings of the National People’s Congress and the Chinese People’s Political Consultative Conference this March. Government guidelines released at the end of 2013 encouraged  inclusion of the values in the overall national education plan and instructed that they be “made a way of thinking for students”. While most of these values are predictable (integrity, patriotism, civility, etc.), several stand out as seemingly incongruous with the common Western understanding of China, and with China’s long-established wariness of importing Western political democracy: freedom, justice, equality, democracy, and rule of law. None of these phrases in and of themselves is new. Since his ascension, President Xi Jinping has made “rule of law” a policy cornerstone (the concept itself stretches back to the second or third century BCE). “Rule of law” was the theme of the Fourth Plenum in 2014, and has featured prominently in government documents ever since. What Xi means by this has been vigorously discussed by both Western and Chinese analysts; some see it as merely a tool for party control and others approach it more optimistically, arguing that at the very least, it’s unprecedented recognition that the government needs to improve governance and address public grievances. As for “democracy,” the actual term stems back over a century to when Japanese writers added it to the Chinese lexicon during the Meiji Revolution. (Technically, citizens can elect members to the local People’s Congresses.) Freedom, justice, and equality are also oft-repeated buzzwords that the Chinese understand as ideals to work toward, rather than proclaimed accomplishments. Again, none of these phrases is really new, nor do they suggest a newfound desire for China to adopt the tenets of liberal democracy as understood in the West. What does make the situation interesting is that Xi has decided to go beyond espousing the rhetoric in national policy forums and government documents, and is now using terms like “rule of law” and “democracy” in a popular, value-driven context. Furthermore, while every Chinese leader comes in with a new set of guiding moral principles (coupled with a vigorous propaganda campaign), those undertaken by Xi’s predecessors did not raise eyebrows. Hu Jintao’s “Eight Honors and Eight Shames” and Jiang Zemin’s “Three Stresses” both remained comfortably within the Chinese rhetoric and targeted for Chinese consumption. Why would Xi do this? Why expend the effort and resources to popularize centuries-old terms, and ones already espoused in state documentation? Primarily: to win hearts and minds, both at home and abroad, and for all types of people. Xin Ming, professor at the Party School of the CPC Central Committee, said that core socialist values had an important position in China’s soft power efforts. With the advent of social media and the proliferation of people-to-people exchanges, the Chinese people are increasingly questioning China’s place in the world and the contradictions inherent in China’s rise. Growing insecurity and dissatisfaction have carved a void begging to be filled. While there is little evidence that anyone takes the values seriously—the local fervor for riddles and lanterns is just the typical response to any top-down directive —it may signal, for the cautiously optimistic, that the country is moving in the right direction, and thus tamp down any nascent dissent. The fact is, despite frequent internal criticism, most Chinese people want to believe that China is on the right path. Nothing is more comforting than hearing that China, too, has what everyone else has. By adopting language pleasant to Western ears, it’s clear that Xi meant this to be far more than a domestic propaganda campaign however.  Indeed, Xi, himself, alluded to the core socialist values in his first speech to the UN General Assembly last September, stressing that values such as freedom, justice, democracy and equality are “common...[to] all of mankind and the lofty goals of the United Nations” and that China would work hard to “renew [its] commitments to the purposes and principles of the UN Charter”. State-owned publications do not shy from proclaiming that the views of Chinese leaders on values are also “hailed by the international community,”and that “China always regards its contributions to the values shared by [mankind] as a criterion to assess its performance.” While there’s no doubt that such values should be interpreted in the Chinese context, this is still quite the rhetorical departure for a state in which cultural relativism has been a favorite trump card. The power of launching a widespread, in-your-face campaign is that these core values reach beyond keen China-watchers and diplomats. Xi’s values campaign is as much for the foreign tourist as it is for the Chinese layperson. For the average foreigner not well-versed in Chinese politics, or one accustomed to stories about China’s vengeful authoritarianism, core socialist values can foster a sense of commonality with their Chinese peers. Non-specialists and specialists alike, also want to believe that China on the right path—the same path as the West. Perhaps all of this comes from recognition of failure, or frustration at being misunderstood. In recent years, the Chinese leadership has encouraged the growth of think tanks and promoted Confucius Institutes, but like its megaphone diplomacy, these efforts have borne little fruit. Xi has realized that it’s useless to sell China in a language not understood by outsiders. Maybe the Chinese government has finally caught on that before it could project a palatable national image, one more in line with its self-proclaimed desire to be a responsible stakeholder, it must convince its people too. So, at the end of the day, can we sum up Xi’s campaign as simply another aspect of his soft power project—one that cleverly appropriates Western rhetoric? After all, China has long run away from terms that even hinted links with Western democracy. Any mention of “universal values” from the state media, even in a positive light, is accompanied by reminders to respect cultural diversity. Xi could very well go further in enhancing “justice” and “rule of law” without getting anywhere close to the intentions of the UN Charter. The recent foreign NGO law, marketed as a step toward stronger rule of law, is one cause for concern. In his outburst in Canada early last month, Foreign Minister Wang Yi made it clear that there was no easy reconciliation between Western and Chinese values, despite what his commander-in-chief espouses. A less cynical observer might say that this “core socialist values” campaign should not be so easily dismissed. Given China’s jealous protection of its image and its full awareness of the implications behind word choice, it’s unlikely that Xi would go out of his way to say things, much less repeat them, if he doesn’t mean them at all. After all, Xi has something to lose here. Core socialist values will no doubt become more entrenched in the public consciousness and raise expectations— and this can backfire to undermine the CCP’s original vernacular co-optation. For the activists and reform-minded, this language provides the tools to carve more spaces for incremental change. As for the average laypeople, they now have the language to engage more purposefully with Westerners and Western discourse, which, for better or for worse, could be a starting point for widespread grassroots contention. China wants to engage the world on its own terms, but the very contradictions inherent within its new core values suggest that there is malleability with its stance. The limitations to reform are real, as are the forces for change.  

Supreme Court Rules on Corruption The U.S. Supreme Court overturned former Virginia Governor Bob McDonnell’s bribery conviction for accepting over $175,000 worth of gifts and loans—including a Rolex watch, designer clothes, and luxury getaways—allegedly in return for favorable business treatment. The court said this did not count as an “official act” of bribery under U.S. law, raising the bar for federal prosecutions of public sector corruption. States can help fill the gap, as Virginia did in the wake of the scandal, setting a straightforward $100 annual cap on gifts from lobbyists and other individuals or businesses angling for government deals or support. Other states ban or set strict gift limits. In Florida, lobbyists (or those who hire them) cannot give more than a flower arrangement; in California, officials cannot accept anything valued over $250. Several states prohibit gifts with “intent to influence”—a hard case to prove. Check out your jurisdiction here. China’s Anticorruption Drive Goes Global? China says it needs help to take on corruption. Its antigraft unit asked Western countries to assist its “Operation Fox Hunt” efforts to repatriate corrupt officials that fled abroad. The nation seems less interested in abiding by widely-agreed upon international norms or helping set new ones. As G20 president, China scuttled the “Business 20” Anticorruption Task Force, established in 2010 to develop rules on transparency and shell company ownership. Working group members said China’s move sets back efforts to expose shell companies that conceal ill-gotten assets. And China has yet to follow through on a promise to join the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) Working Group on Bribery, a necessary step toward signing onto the legally-binding OECD convention that would force China to hold its companies accountable for paying bribes abroad. Panama Canal Opens Amid Uncertainty The Panama Canal finally opened its nine-year, $5.4 billion expansion. The new canal permits ships carrying up to 13,000 containers—more than double its former capacity—to pass between the Atlantic and Pacific. It comes online amid slowing global trade and shipping industry woes. Only some East Coast ports are ready—others remain cut off due to too-low bridges for the new mega-freighters, too-small terminals, and a lack of modern railways and roads to get the goods to consumer markets. As former Port of Los Angeles director Geraldine Knatz explains in an interview with CSMD, to boost U.S. port competitiveness, the government needs to re-examine how it invests in them.

Corruption Probes Spook Ericsson Investors Both U.S. and Greek authorities are taking on Ericsson AB, one of the world’s biggest telecoms companies, for alleged corruption. The United States is investigating its operations in both China and Romania for potential Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) violations. The Greeks summoned seven current and former executives over whether the Swedish multinational bribed government officials to win a $597 million defense contract in 1999. These inquires come at a time when the company faces stiff competition, declining sales, and falling share prices. Ericsson is now trying to ease investors’ concerns, hoping the revelations do not get worse. EU Membership Spurs Anticorruption Action The European Union’s (EU) anticorruption requirements are shaping rules for current and would-be members. In Serbia they have prompted antigraft activism as the nation pushes to enter the union. Authorities arrested eighty current and former officials for corruption and financial crimes late last year. And its courts just sentenced Miroslav Mišković, a politically-connected billionaire, to five years in prison for tax evasion. EU membership also likely helped keep Romania from backsliding, as the recent effort to decriminalize public official corruption—rejected by Romania’s constitutional court—would have violated its EU obligations. The move came after the nation’s anticorruption prosecutors took on a record 1,250 cases, convicting over 90 percent, including twenty-one members of parliament and the former prime minister. India’s Modi Courts Foreign Investment Despite India’s size and global heft, it so far has failed to capture its fair share of foreign direct investment (FDI). In 2015 it brought in $44 billion compared to demographically similar China’s $136 billion, and Brazil’s $65 billion. This matters, as studies show FDI brings jobs, new technologies, and can help emerging economies increase the value added in their production and exports. Now Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s government is easing many restrictions on investment. New rules allow foreign investors to fully own defense, aviation, and food companies. They also lower domestic content laws for consumer goods, making it easier for companies like Apple and Ikea to open stores in India. It remains to be seen whether these efforts will be enough to offset the still complex tax system and strict labor rules (that often require government approval for layoffs), to bring in foreign companies and dollars.

April and May brought some of the most important movement on the anticorruption front of any two-month period in the past decade. Recapitulating briefly: - In April, the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) began release of the Panama Papers, roughly 11 million leaked documents from the Mossack Fonseca law firm detailing the creation of more than 15,000 shell companies and providing information on more than 200,000 offshore entities. The lists touched on a variety of presumably legal uses of offshore firms, but also sprayed egg on a number of prominent faces, including in Russia, Ukraine, China, the United Kingdom (UK), Spain, Chile, Argentina, Iceland, and within the International Federation of Association Football (FIFA), among others. A follow-up manifesto by John Doe, the whistleblower at the heart of the leak, noted the extensive use of offshore accounts as part of a system of “massive, pervasive corruption” in the global economy. If nothing else, the Panama Papers have introduced the concept of “beneficial ownership” to a broader public, and fomented a larger discussion of how the West enables corrupt practices through loose monitoring of offshoring and financial disclosure. - The reports were followed in May by measures by the Obama administration to “combat money laundering, corruption, and tax evasion…,” stimulated in part by the Panama Papers, as well as the impending UK Anti-Corruption Summit (below). Among the administration measures were proposals to strengthen anticorruption efforts by requiring greater due diligence and disclosure regarding corporate ownership, and requiring foreigners setting up shop in the United States to obtain a tax identification number. Critics have noted (for example, here and here) that many of the measures will require legislative approval, which will be slow in coming, and many of the proposals do not go far enough in involving important gatekeepers in due diligence. But the Obama administration’s moves are at least a recognition of the problem, and perhaps may set the stage for future change. They also come in the wake of the announcement of much-needed increases in the human resources devoted to anticorruption efforts at both the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) and the U.S. Department of Justice. - Finally, on May 12, at the Anti-Corruption Summit in the UK moved forward, millimetrically, on a proposal for public registries and an international information-sharing center on beneficial ownership. Only six countries are fully committed to the registries project, and the United States remains aloof, but at least the idea is on the table. If nothing else, governments will need to explain what they find problematic about the idea, even if they ultimately refuse to join up. These three developments highlight the stop-and-start nature of anticorruption efforts: as so often happens in the public policy world, a small group of anticorruption campaigners have kept the issue on the table during times of relative inattention to corruption. The shock generated by the Panama Papers created a small window of opportunity for policy change, when campaigners’ ideas and proposals could be placed before policymakers briefly focused on the problem and eager to hear about ready solutions. Whether these proposals move forward will depend significantly on the support they receive against a barrage of likely opposition. Five years ago, author Nicholas Shaxson noted that the biggest tax havens in the world are islands. Islands, he concluded tongue-in-cheek, such as Manhattan and the City of London. Tax havens are estimated to hold as much as $20 trillion, more than all U.S. banks. Furthermore, the Tax Justice Network ranks the U.S. as the world’s third-easiest place, after Switzerland and Hong Kong, to set up offshore companies that can be used for everything from tax evasion to hiding beneficial ownership (more here). As Daniel Kaufmann and Alexandra Gillies and Shruti Shah have noted separately, less background information is needed to set up a shell corporation in Delaware than to get a driver’s license or a library card. Beneficial ownership rules thus may face an uphill battle against opposition from the representatives of states dominated by the financial services industry or from lawyers and business groups concerned by increased regulatory costs. Ultimately, success in moving forward in fighting the corruption that disproportionally milks many of the world’s poor will require a sustained campaign that makes it clear to voters and policymakers that it is in the best interest of the United States to staunch the flow of illicit funds around the world. The experience of the past forty years suggests a way forward. The Foreign Corrupt Practices Act (FCPA) of 1977, for example, could never have moved forward without recognition that the offshore corruption of U.S. firms was circling back home in the form of highly damaging illegal campaign finance contributions. Following the FCPA’s passage, business complained—rightly—about the FCPA’s anticompetitive effects, and pressure from business and anti-corruption groups eventually led to passage of international agreements, such as the 1997 Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) Convention on Corruption, that imposed similar corruption-busting regulations on other countries, generating improved conditions for clean global business. There may be costs, in other words, to being a first mover. But there is significant and clear damage to the U.S. national interest when other countries’ corporations compete with ours on an uneven playing field, when corruption weakens and destabilizes our allies, when our treasury is depleted by offshore maneuvering, and worst of all, when our reputation is sullied because we are seen as part of the problem rather than the solution. Everything should be done to reduce the regulatory burden and lessen the costs of compliance. But if there is one lesson from the Panama Papers, it is that the days of ethical neutrality about the tangible costs of undisclosed and unidentifiable offshore financial movements are coming to an end.

Social cohesion, or the strength of a country’s social fabric, is often raised in discussions of security. The World Bank describes it as “fundamental for societies to progress towards development goals,” and for making countries more resilient to bloodshed. In Mexico, policymakers argue social cohesion is both a casualty and a solution for reducing violence. To measure these ties, the think tank México Evalúa constructed the Neighborhood Social Cohesion Index (ICSV). They canvassed four housing complexes scattered throughout Mexico—many isolated, without public services, and composed of poorer households with limited education. The residents were asked to rate their communities on a low to high scale of one to ten in terms of social identity, trust between neighbors, a sense of belonging, and engagement in the community. The four ratings were averaged to produce an aggregate score. Social cohesion in all four communities ranged between 5.1 and 5.4 on the index, indicating that Mexico’s social fabric is not entirely broken, even in these difficult surroundings. In every community a strong sense of belonging and shared identity persisted, even when community engagement lagged. The polls found hope for the future, with nearly nine in ten neighbors saying that if encouraged, they would be “willing to work for the benefit of their community.” The survey also explored the causal links between social cohesion and perceptions of insecurity. Those communities that were rated more cohesive tended to feel safer, and vice-versa. Perceptions of insecurity were high overall: only 12 percent of residents said they would let their children walk alone in their neighborhood, fewer than a third would walk themselves alone at night. One of the pillars of the Mérida Initiative, the main vehicle for U.S.-Mexico security cooperation over the last decade, focuses on building “stronger and more resilient communities.” On the ground, this money has gone to after school programs, citizen watchdogs in law enforcement offices, and creating and expanding drug treatment courts, among other programs. México Evalúa’s survey suggests that expanding basic public services and cleaning up public parks would strengthen communities, as would actively recruiting neighbors to get involved in local events and activities. The Mexican and U.S. governments should use measures such as the Neighborhood Social Cohesion Index both before and after they invest more in fragile communities, to help determine which of the dozens of potential programs actually make things better.

It has been nearly fifteen months since Boko Haram abducted nearly three hundred girls from a secondary school in Chibok, Nigeria, sparking the #BringBackOurGirls campaign on Twitter. Since then, reports have surfaced that the girls have been sold, forcibly converted to Islam, and married to terrorist group members. Dozens of the girls managed to escape, but despite efforts to secure the release of the remaining 219 captives, no agreement has come through. Recent reports from other former captives of Boko Haram indicate that the fate of the Chibok girls has taken an even darker turn. Many are allegedly carrying out atrocities on behalf of Boko Haram, including flogging prisoners who are unable to recite the Quran or killing Christian captives. This is not the first instance of Boko Haram employing women in their attacks. According to the Aljazeera Center for Studies, women were responsible for fifteen of Boko Haram’s successful suicide bombings as of January. An April Amnesty International report includes the story of a girl forced to learn how to shoot, use bombs, and attack villages on pain of death: “Some refused to learn how to kill others. They were buried in a mass grave in the bush. They’ll just pack the dead bodies and dump them in a big hole, but not deep enough.” This is the first report of the Chibok girls participating in atrocities outside of the context of suicide attacks. The 219 girls were last seen in video in May 2014, reciting the Quran and looking terrified. This horrifying revelation raises the question of the girls’ culpability or complicity in Boko Haram’s attacks. It is clear from testimony of eyewitnesses that they have undergone trauma. As one former captive said, “Anyone who sees the Chibok girls has to feel sorry for them,” and experts who have examined other freed captives of Boko Haram called for “intensive psychological treatment.” Given their presumed state of duress, can these girls be held responsible for their actions? One useful framework to answer this question is that of child soldiers under the law. According to the 2007 Paris Principles and Guidelines on Children Associated with Armed Forces and Armed Groups, “children who are accused of crimes under international law allegedly committed while they were associated with armed forced or armed groups should be considered primarily as victims and not as perpetrators.” While this is not an exact legal proscription in the case of the Chibok girls—who were between the ages of sixteen and eighteen, and therefore not considered child soldiers under either the International Criminal Court Statute (ICC) nor the Additional Protocol II of the Geneva Conventions—the fact that the girls likely acted under severe duress should be considered as a mitigating circumstance. Thus, the law of duress is another possible framework for analyzing the legal responsibility of the schoolgirls. The usage of the duress defense varies across international and national legal systems. For example, in most common law countries—including the United States and United Kingdom—duress is only a mitigating circumstance in sentencing, not a complete defense against criminal liability. In international law, under Article 31 of the ICC statute, a defendant can be freed from criminal responsibility for “conduct which is alleged to constitute a crime [that] has been caused by duress resulting from a threat of imminent death or of continuing or imminent serious bodily harm against that person or another person,” as long as he or she “acts necessarily and reasonably to avoid this threat” and “does not intend to cause a greater harm than the one sought to be avoided.” Since we have little information on the circumstances facing the schoolgirls—other than the few skeletal accounts offered from those who have escaped—it is not clear that the Chibok girls’ situation fits this duress defense scenario, particularly regarding the immediacy of the threat of force. A final potential framework is that of Stockholm Syndrome, when a captive becomes bonded to his or her captor or “brainwashed.” Reportedly, the Chibok girls are now acting as Quranic teachers for Boko Haram, making statements like “You women should learn from your husbands because they are giving their blood for the cause. We must also go to war for Allah”—arguably an indication that they may be suffering from one of these types of conditions. In one of the most famous cases characterized as turning on Stockholm Syndrome—that of Patty Hearst, who carried out an armed robbery on behalf of her kidnappers, the Symbionese Liberation Army—the duress defense  was not successful, since she committed the crime after the initial state of duress. In fact, though Hearst was characterized as “brainwashed” in the media, a court-appointed expert in the Hearst case noted that “brainwashing” was actually a misnomer for the coercion alleged in the case. Given the limited information available about the current state of the Chibok girls, it is difficult to know whether they could be held culpable for their actions under international or Nigerian law. But rehabilitation should be considered as a primary response, in contrast to punishment, for the ordeal they have suffered for too long.

Earlier this month, Pakistani authorities revealed that eight of the ten men accused in the 2012 attack on Malala Yousafzai were acquitted, despite a previous announcement that all ten were sentenced to twenty-five years in prison. Malala’s case is especially remarkable considering she won the 2014 Nobel Peace Prize, recognizing her advocacy for girls’ education even after being shot in the head for her work. The regional deputy police chief, Azad Khan, was quoted in the New York Times saying that the men “were released for lack of evidence,” chalking the verdict up to a failure of Pakistan’s justice system. The trial was reportedly held in one of Pakistan’s secretive anti-terrorism courts, where decisions are made behind closed doors in an attempt to protect judges. According to the same article, “such trials are hampered by poor evidentiary standards and the security forces’ widely documented pattern of rounding up suspects, sometimes on flimsy grounds, and of obtaining confessions through torture.” Yet the acquittal of Malala’s attackers comes at a moment when Pakistan is coming under scrutiny from human rights organizations for the opposite reason: exceedingly harsh punishments—including nearly 140 executions in the last six months—from the same flawed anti-terror courts. A recent New America Foundation paper details the recent changes in Pakistan’s counterterrorism legal system, instituted following the December attack on a school that killed over 130 children. The paper argues that although the amendments have the “commendable goals of reducing delays and ensuring better security for judges trying terrorism cases, the legitimacy of the process has suffered from stripping away the traditional protections like an open trial, right to counsel, and burden of proof on the prosecution” that used to be afforded the accused. While this disregard for the legal and human rights of terrorism suspects is a significant flaw in Pakistan’s justice system, so too is the inequality evident in the handing down of sentences from these courts. While terrorism suspects are hanged “left, right, and center,” members of extremist groups who are suspects in cases of gender-based violence, like Malala’s, or attacks on religious minority groups go unpunished. According to International Crisis Group, women in Pakistan have long been the “principal victims of state policies to appease violent extremists.” Despite a pledge from Prime Minister Nawaz Sharif on March 8, 2015, International Women’s Day, that the “government would take all necessary legislative and administrative steps to protect and empower women,” it is clear that such legal reforms are still lacking. Pakistan’s justice system is flawed in many ways, and reform is necessary to ensure the protection of the human and legal rights of the accused. Yet any reform must also address the unequal application of the law toward women and girls, like Malala, who are survivors of gender-based violence.

Although it may have slipped from headlines, the conflict in Sudan’s western region of Darfur has not disappeared. Indeed, the region has seen almost unabated violence for over a decade, notably spiking in January 2013. In February of this year, a Human Rights Watch report shed light on the violence, documenting mass rape and other atrocities committed by forces loyal to the Sudanese government from October 30 to November 1, 2014. Though these stories of government-allied Janjaweed militias ravaging Darfur harken back to the early 2000s—when pro-government militias carried out systematic killings across the region—a new factor has emerged in the conflict since the separation of Sudan and South Sudan: the Sudanese government’s struggle to finance and maintain the support of their proxy militias. Before South Sudan’s independence, much of Sudanese government revenues came from oil located in what is now South Sudan. Though Sudan now earns some fees for allowing the transport of oil out of landlocked South Sudan, civil conflict within South Sudan and standoffs between the two nations have made this an uncertain source of revenue. Without this income, the Sudanese government has turned its attention to another natural resource: Darfur’s gold mines. The Sudanese government not only operates the country’s sole gold refinery, it is also the only entity allowed to sell gold abroad. To encourage miners to sell their gold to the government, rather than to smugglers, the Central Bank offers competitive prices, leaving the government with an effective monopoly on the trade. Though the IMF reports that gold accounted for only 13 percent of Sudan’s exports in 2011, that figured had skyrocketed to 42 percent by 2012. Yet Darfur’s gold is not just financing these militias and the human rights violations they commit; the search for gold and efforts to consolidate control of gold mines are also a cause of conflict. A report by the Enough Project outlines the government of Sudan’s “strategy of economic plunder of the periphery through violence and forcible demographic change.” The discovery of new gold mines in the area has even led to harassment of Arab groups traditionally exempt from attacks by government-sponsored militias. Given the role of gold in funding and spurring conflict in Darfur, especially the egregious instances of sexual violence and ethnic cleansing reported by Human Rights Watch, international consumers and traders should take steps to ensure the gold they purchase is not sourced from conflict-ridden areas. As a February New York Times op-ed suggests, “International banks, gold refiners, and associations like the Dubai Multi Commodities Center and the London Bullion Market Association should raise alerts for Sudanese gold and initiate audits to trace it all to its mine of origin to ensure that purchases are not fueling war crimes in Darfur.” A similar campaign has been started for gold originating in the Democratic Republic of the Congo (DRC). The Enough Project’s #CongoGold “Look Who’s Getting Engaged” campaign highlights major jewelry retailers that have taken steps such as establishing supply chain controls and supporting communities affected by mining and violence. While the DRC gold campaign is not as extensive as the Kimberley Process for certifying diamonds, an agreement between governments and the diamond industry that requires participating states to pass legislation and export and import controls, it is an improvement over the lack of any such system or movement targeting Sudanese conflict gold. Human rights organizations have proposed steps in Sudan including United Nations’ investigations into major Sudanese gold traders, U.S. legislative action to curtail trade in conflict-affected gold, and greater gold industry due diligence. Though sometimes criticized, the Kimberley Process serves as a good model. It is credited with reducing the percentage of conflict diamonds reaching international markets from 4 to 1 percent. The Kimberley Process also walks a fine line: it works with governments—which are necessary to efforts to control gold supply chains in their respective nations—while ensuring that the organization does not become too bureaucratic or politicized. Any approach to supply chain management of conflict-affected resources should similarly incorporate both governmental and nongovernmental action, as the Enough Project’s proposal for Sudan does. To generate economic pressure on Sudan, governments and international organizations should work with private sector and other nongovernmental actors.

Corruption allegations and revelations cover Mexico’s front pages. Public officials’ penchant for expensive watches, use of government helicopters for personal errands, and a string of expensive houses facilitated by preferred private contractors have incensed not only Mexico’s chattering classes but also the broader public. 2014 opinion polls conducted by the Pew Research Center show corruption ranks second only to crime in citizen concerns. The challenge of corruption goes beyond just a few bad seeds. A 2013 survey found that one third of Mexicans paid a bribe for a public service. Think tank Mexico ¿cómo vamos? estimates corruption reduces gross domestic product by 2 percent. Due to rampant corruption among judges and police (as well as weak investigation and adjudication systems), the World Justice Project’s international rule of law index ranks Mexico seventy-ninth out of ninety-nine countries, comparable to Egypt and Russia. Things may be poised to finally begin changing. After dragging its feet for nearly three years (anti-corruption promises were part of the original Pact for Mexico signed in December 2012), Congress recently passed constitutional reforms that will provide stronger tools to prevent, investigate, and sanction government corruption. The new National Anti-Corruption System targets the political system, requiring more public officials to report their assets and any potential conflicts of interest, strengthening the hand of federal auditors, expanding asset forfeiture laws, and creating a new independent anti-corruption prosecutor. Transparency International’s Mexico chapter has welcomed the reform, and others, including local think tank Instituto Mexicano para la Competitividad, see it as a step in the right direction. Shifts are already underway at the local level, led by Mexico City. Current mayor Miguel Angel Mancera announced an anti-corruption plan in early 2013 with five main aims: (1) professionalize public servants through training and evaluation; (2) strengthen internal controls; (3) simplify administrative processes; (4) engage citizens; and (5) create an anti-corruption website. Since then, the capital has appointed hundreds of new auditors and nearly doubled the number of investigations. It has suspended over 900 public officials and recovered roughly $9 million in illicit funds. The 21 million person megalopolis now has a citizen advisory council to supervise anti-corruption efforts, made up of business and non-profit executives, academics, and lawyers. And it “names and shames” sanctioned officials and disqualified suppliers through publicly available lists. In New York last week, Mancera signed on with the NGO Open Contracting Partnership (OCP) to become their first city partner to create an online portal opening up the capital city’s public contracts to citizen scrutiny. In their infancy, these reforms have yet to prove themselves, and if they can change the status quo. Mexico City’s nascent trial shows some promise. If Mancera can show visible anti-graft results in the capital city, it could prove a savvy political platform for the 2018 presidential election. This blog has been reposted from CFR’s Latin America’s Moment blog.

Corruption allegations and revelations cover Mexico’s front pages. Public officials’ penchant for expensive watches, use of government helicopters for personal errands, and a string of expensive houses facilitated by preferred private contractors have incensed not only Mexico’s chattering classes but also the broader public. 2014 opinion polls conducted by the Pew Research Center show corruption ranks second only to crime in citizen concerns. The challenge of corruption goes beyond just a few bad seeds. A 2013 survey found that one third of Mexicans paid a bribe for a public service. Think tank Mexico ¿cómo vamos? estimates corruption reduces gross domestic product by 2 percent. Due to rampant corruption among judges and police (as well as weak investigation and adjudication systems), the World Justice Project’s international rule of law index ranks Mexico seventy-ninth out of ninety-nine countries, comparable to Egypt and Russia. Things may be poised to finally begin changing. After dragging its feet for nearly three years (anti-corruption promises were part of the original Pact for Mexico signed in December 2012), Congress recently passed constitutional reforms that will provide stronger tools to prevent, investigate, and sanction government corruption. The new National Anti-Corruption System targets the political system, requiring more public officials to report their assets and any potential conflicts of interest, strengthening the hand of federal auditors, expanding asset forfeiture laws, and creating a new independent anti-corruption prosecutor. Transparency International’s Mexico chapter has welcomed the reform, and others, including local think tank Instituto Mexicano para la Competitividad, see it as a step in the right direction. Shifts are already underway at the local level, led by Mexico City. Current mayor Miguel Angel Mancera announced an anti-corruption plan in early 2013 with five main aims: (1) professionalize public servants through training and evaluation; (2) strengthen internal controls; (3) simplify administrative processes; (4) engage citizens; and (5) create an anti-corruption website. Since then, the capital has appointed hundreds of new auditors and nearly doubled the number of investigations. It has suspended over 900 public officials and recovered roughly $9 million in illicit funds. The 21 million person megalopolis now has a citizen advisory council to supervise anti-corruption efforts, made up of business and non-profit executives, academics, and lawyers. And it “names and shames” sanctioned officials and disqualified suppliers through publicly available lists. In New York last week, Mancera signed on with the NGO Open Contracting Partnership (OCP) to become their first city partner to create an online portal opening up the capital city’s public contracts to citizen scrutiny. In their infancy, these reforms have yet to prove themselves, and if they can change the status quo. Mexico City’s nascent trial shows some promise. If Mancera can show visible anti-graft results in the capital city, it could prove a savvy political platform for the 2018 presidential election.

Progress toward women’s rights and empowerment cannot be made without actors on the ground willing to fight for it. This is particularly true in Afghanistan as the United States begins to transition out of its on-the-ground presence and the Afghan government takes on more responsibility for security and stability. Local women’s rights movements will be more important than ever in ensuring Afghan women and girls maintain the strides they have made since the fall of the Taliban. Yet if those willing to stand up for the rights of women are not protected by the government, security forces, and justice system, progress cannot be made. In December 2013, the UN General Assembly passed a resolution to this effect. The document calls on states to protect women’s human rights defenders, acknowledging that “women of all ages who engage in the promotion and protection of all human rights and fundamental freedoms and all people who engage in the defense of the rights of women and gender equality, individually and in association with others, play an important role, at the local, national, regional, and international levels, in the promotion and protection of human rights.” According to a recent Amnesty International report, these protections for Afghan women’s human rights defenders are not strong enough to deter attacks. Consider the story of Rohgul Khairkhwah, a female senator for the Nimroz province in southern Afghanistan: On August 4, 2013, the Taliban attacked Senator Khairkhwah’s vehicle, killing her seven-year-old daughter and brother. The senator was shot nine times, sustaining wounds to her liver, lung, and leg, and necessitating a two-month hospital stay. Though she has kept the National Directorate of Security (NDS) informed of the threats against her, little has been done. “When the threats began, the NDS told her that they were merely ‘designed to create a climate of fear’... Two years later, Senator Khairkhwah still has no answer as to who is responsible for the murder of her daughter and brother.” To improve the status of Afghan women and ensure their ability to participate in public life, such attacks cannot go under-investigated and unpunished. As I’ve continually noted, the best support the United States and other international allies can provide to Afghan women—and ultimately to Afghanistan—is to support these local defenders of women’s human rights. Through projects such as USAID’s Promote, the United States can help to strengthen women’s rights organizations so that Afghan women can continue to advocate for themselves.

As Afghanistan works to maintain stability in the wake of the U.S. drawdown, I have consistently written about the unique challenges faced by women and girls in the changing security landscape. One strategy that I—and other commentators on Afghanistan—have called for to ensure the safety of women and girls and the continued expansion of women’s rights is the greater inclusion of women in the Afghan police force. Yet recent reporting in the New York Times exposes the downside of this push to expand the female police force in Afghanistan: the risks and threats to female officers’ personal safety. The article details the daily sexual harassment female officers face on the job, their fear of violence or heckling while traveling to and from work in their uniforms, and the widespread lack of facilities such as toilets or changing rooms for women. Though these risks and worse—the article also notes the recent murder of a female police officer—are extremely serious and should be of concern to the Afghan government and its allies, the presence of danger does not mean that the goal of increasing female participation in the police force is itself flawed. A Western diplomat quoted in the New York Times article called the project an “absurdity of imposing our liberal Western beliefs.” While the notions of equality and rights may be traced to the liberal Western period of enlightenment, achieving even the most basic trapping of equality—the right to vote—has not come without struggle anywhere, including in the West. It took two hundred years for women to gain suffrage in the United States, and American women are still fighting for full equality in the political, economic, legal, and other realms. The push for women’s rights—like any redistribution of power and resources—often involves a long-term struggle. Things have to change across a multitude of sectors for women to truly gain equality: more participation in politics, increased access to education, greater economic empowerment, higher numbers of women in leadership roles, as well as fundamental shifts in attitude by the public. No country—neither Afghanistan nor nations in the West—could expect such changes to occur rapidly and all at once. The fact that achieving rights for women is a challenge now does not mean that it will not be successful in the future. And in the meanwhile, there are certainly bright spots. The article highlighted the critical role of female officers in family-response units, “which give female victims a chance to talk to a policewoman and gain access to female lawyers” when they may not feel comfortable speaking with men. In the midst of U.S. drawdown, Afghan women—and the women’s empowerment programs that the United States supports—are threatened by instability. The United States cannot cut and run. As the same Western diplomat is quoted saying, “It’s easy for us to put these women out there and tout their accomplishments, but then we leave, cut them loose, and what happens to them?”

This week, the New York Times reported that 32 officers of the Afghan National Police (ANP) in the Kunduz province are under suspicion in an ongoing investigation for corruption and ties to the Taliban. The report details harrowing crimes committed by police in Kunduz, including the kidnapping of children and rape of the citizens they are meant to protect. These allegations of police corruption and alliances with Taliban bear out concerns—highlighted in my working paper—about the ability of the Afghan police forces to maintain safety with the U.S. drawdown and the implications of the security transition for Afghan women and girls specifically. The time has come for Afghanistan to develop the capacity to provide security for themselves. An extended U.S. military presence would only hamper Afghanistan’s journey toward self-sufficiency in the security sector. Yet the question remains: without active and direct U.S. involvement in Afghanistan’s security, are the ANP and other Afghan security actors up to the task of maintaining a safe and stable public sphere? Security in the public space is particularly critical for women and girls. During the Taliban’s rule in Afghanistan from 1996 to 2001, women and girls were barred and intimidated from participating in many sectors of society. Since the fall of the Taliban, Afghan women and girls have made huge gains in education, employment, and political participation. Yet in order for continued strides in gender equality, stability and security on the ground is vital. Maintaining a safe public space for all Afghan citizens—and ensuring women and girls have the space to grow—requires a competent and professional civilian police force. Weeding out corruption in the ANP is a start, but there is more that the Afghan government can do to improve its police force. By professionalizing the police force, properly testing and vetting police leadership, and providing officers adequate pay and benefits, future officers will be less susceptible to corruption. Furthermore, the government should work to broaden the inclusion of female officers in the police force—of the ANP’s over 150,000 staff, just over 1,500 are women—and police training programs should focus on respect for human rights, including women’s rights. Building a professional police force with the ability to protect the public space is important not only for women and girls, but for Afghanistan as a whole. And the positive effects of stability in Afghanistan do not stop at the border. More broadly, Afghan security, stability, and prosperity are necessary for counterterrorism and security efforts in the region and, ultimately, U.S. national security interests.