Editor’s note: This article is part of an ongoing WPR series on the impact of corruption and various countries’ efforts to combat it. Last month, the European Union released its annual progress report for Montenegro, which highlighted the need for further government reforms to tackle persistent corruption. In an email interview, Vanja Calovic, the executive director of MANS, a nongovernmental organization that fights corruption and organized crime in Montenegro, discussed corruption there. WPR: How big of a problem is corruption in Montenegro, and in what areas is its impact most felt? Vanja Calovic: Montenegro has been guided by the same [...]
Editor’s note: This article is part of an ongoing WPR series on the impact of corruption and various countries’ efforts to combat it. The trial for 46 people accused of running a Mafia crime ring in Rome that had infiltrated city hall began earlier this month. In an email interview, Daniel Gros, the director of the Center for European Policy Studies in Brussels, discussed Italy’s fight against corruption. WPR: How big a problem is corruption in Italy, and in what areas—including which levels of government—is its impact most felt? Daniel Gros: Outright corruption is mainly a problem at the subnational [...]
Editor’s note: This article is part of an ongoing WPR series on the impact of corruption and various countries’ efforts to combat it. Last month, the Moldovan Parliament voted to dismiss the government of Prime Minister Valeriu Strelet. The move came weeks after former Prime Minister Vlad Filat, who was also a former leader of the ruling coalition member Liberal Democratic Party, was arrested as part of an investigation into $1 billion that went missing from the country’s banking system.* In an email interview, Balázs Jarábik, a nonresident scholar at the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace, discussed Moldova’s fight against [...]
