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The new US Congress was sworn in Tuesday with stronger Democratic majorities in both the House of Representatives and the Senate that are expected to help president-elect Barack Obama push through his legislative agenda.
But the first day of the 111th Congress was overshadowed by controversy, as the Senate refused to seat Roland...
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A culture of bribery and impunity flourished at German corporate giant Siemens AG over the past decade despite repeated warnings from outside and inside the firm, according to US court documents.
The details were released Monday as Siemens pleaded guilty in US District Court in Washington to a massive global corruption scandal...
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Democrats increased their control of Congress in US elections Tuesday, picking up significant gains in the Senate and House of Representatives by capitalizing on a backlash against Republicans and President George W Bush.
The Democrats won three Senate seats vacated by retiring Republicans in Virginia, New Mexico and Colorado, while...
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The New York Post reports that Carla Katz, the former girlfriend of New Jersey Governor Jon Corzine, is under federal investigationHaving a subpoena, investigators from the Newark US Attorney's Strike Force unit hit the Washington DC head quarters of the Communications Workers of America, looking for the economic and management records...
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Washington, May 27 – Former Illinois
Governor George Ryan and a co-defendant Larry Warner lost their chance to get
out of prison, by losing a U.S. Supreme Court appeal. The main arguments
brought in front of the justice were based on the fact that their constitutional
rights had been violated when the panel of judges dismissed two...
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 The corruption trial of the political fundraiser Antoin
Rezko is being called one of the biggest corruption trials since that of Gov.
George Ryan. He is accused of scheming to get bribes and kickbacks for
favorable votes from the regulatory Illinois Health Facilities Planning Board
and the $40 billion state Teachers Retirement...
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 Ms. Diane M. Gordon, 58, of Brooklyn
was convicted on Tuesday of corruption. Ms. Gordon, a former schoolteacher with
a business degree and a four-term Democrat from East New
York, was accused of receiving bribe.
The New York Times reports that she was convicted of bribe-receiving
in the third degree –soliciting or agreeing...
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A federal appeals court released Donald Siegelman, former
governor of Alabama
from prison, where he had spent nine months of a seven year sentence. He was
convicted on six corruption counts and one count of obstruction of justice. His
appeal was based on the fact that he was politically prosecuted.
The federal prosecutors have...
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 After only 24 hours from returning from his unexplained
two-week absence with the disclosure of his emergency stay in a rehabilitation
clinic that treats substance abuse and psychiatric problems, Atlantic City
Mayor Robert W. Levy resigned on Wednesday.
Levy’s resignation after slightly more than a year in
office, and the...
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 Federal Bureau of Investigation and Internal Revenue Service agents have conducted a search of Sen. Ted Stevens' Alaska home as a result of a corruption investigation. The senator, 83, is the oldest Republican in the U.S. Congress.Stevens is under investigation for a 2000 renovation project which more than doubled the size of his home in...
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Italy's police forces are about to be equipped with a Ferrari and a Porsche seized from the mafia, Interior Minister Roberto Maroni said Monday.
The luxury cars - a Ferrari 512 and a Porsche Cayenne - form part of a haul of some 4 billion euros (5.5 billion dollars) worth of assets confiscated from organized criminals in Italy during...
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German turbine maker Siemens said Monday it had won a major order from Iraq for 16 high-efficiency gas turbines costing 1.5 billion euros (2.1 billion dollars).
Iraq's ministry of electricity is struggling to end constant power outages and restore damaged oil and gas-fired power stations.
Siemens, the Munich-based conglomerate...
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Hundreds of demonstrators clashed Thursday with police in front of the Greek parliament in central Athens, with protesters hurling paint and riot police retaliating with tear gas.
The clashes took place while thousands marched in anti-government demonstrations across Greece to protest against the conservative government's reforms and...
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Hundreds of demonstrators battled rain on Thursday to march through the Greek capital and cities across the country against the conservative government's reforms and the recent police shooting of a teenager.
All flights to and from Athens' International Airport were halted for several hours due to a strike by air traffic controllers...
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The Romanian centre-right Democratic Liberal Party (PD-L) is to take the key economic portfolios in the country's new cabinet, while coalition partner - the socialist PSD party - is to receive social portfolios, including the ministry for work, families and social security, party sources said Wednesday.
The new cabinet is currently...
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Croatia's efforts to deal with corruption in prisons suffered a hard blow Wednesday after a local daily published a price list of "services" provided in jails.
Croatian daily Slobodna Dalmacija reported, quoting "prison sources" that for a certain price, prisoners in Croatian jails can move to a minimal security...
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Former head of the Polish football federation (PZPN) Michal Listkiewicz took the stand on Tuesday as a witness in an ongoing investigation into corruption in the sport.
Listkiewicz said he'd answered "honestly" after about an hour on the stand in a Wroclaw court. He did not give details about the proceedings.
"I...
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Romania's top two political parties, the Socialists (PSD) and the Democratic Liberals (PDL), agreed Sunday to form a grand coalition to govern the country following October's inconclusive election result.
The two parties agreed to form a "partnership for Romania" by signing the coalition agreement. In light of coming...
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Greek riot police fired tear gas into crowds of protesting students and teachers, who pelted them with rocks and chunks of marble in front of parliament in the seventh day of civil unrest Friday.
Waving black and red anarchist flags, hundreds of students, made their way up the steps to parliament to the Tomb of the Unknown Soldier...
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Hundreds of mask-wearing municipal workers used bulldozers and water hoses to clear the streets of Athens from marble chunks, broken glass and burned barricades on Thursday following five days of rioting and social unrest.
While no major demonstrations were planned Thursday, authorities braced themselves for more civil unrest as...
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Ukraine's new ruling majority in parliament hit a glitch on Wednesday with one member party declaring a formal coalition agreement on the deal is yet to be signed.
MP Ksenia Liapina speaking for the Our Ukraine People's Union party (OUPU) said parliament leaders had four days to hammer out a common platform and get it approved by...
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The chief executive of the European Union's anti- fraud watchdog OLAF warned Bulgaria Thursday that it must begin convicting corrupt officials, or risk losing the battle against organized crime.
OLAF director Franz-Hermann Bruener met Prime Minister Sergey Stanishev, Deputy Premier in Charge of EU Funds Management Meglena Kuneva and...
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The International Trade Union Confederation ITUC said Thursday that 91 trade unionists were murdered around the world in 2007, with the most dangerous country continuing to be the Central American state of Colombia.
In its 2008 Annual Survey of Trade Union Rights Violations, the ITUC said that 39 unionists were killed in...
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Two former executives at the German multinational Siemens were given prison terms Wednesday for assisting in a 1.3- billion-euro (1.6-billion-dollar) worldwide web of bribery.
The men, 58 and 69, had admitted being accessories to misappropriation and corruption at the two-day trial in Munich. Kickbacks were paid in various nations...
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The Swedish cabinet Thursday approved a plan to boost personnel and aid to Afghanistan, Foreign Minister Carl Bildt said.
Sweden is to raise its some 400-strong force in northern Afghanistan to around 500 next year.
Along with forces from neighbouring Finland, the Swedish forces are based in Mazar-e-Sharif in northern Afghanistan...
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Massive restructuring costs and efforts to root out corruption combined to drive German engineering giant Siemens into the red during the final quarter of the 2007-08 business year.
The company posted a net loss of 2.4 billion euros (3 billion dollars), a sharp fall from a year ago when the loss was 74 million euros, Siemens said...
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Fisheries production in the Central Asian and Caucasus republics has "plummeted dramatically" in the years following the collapse of the Soviet Union, a UN food agency said Monday.
The crisis is topping the agenda when nine member nations of the Food and Agriculture Organization (FAO) began meeting in Tajikistan on...
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German President Horst Koehler leaves Friday on a six-day visit to Nigeria, during which he will take part in a conference on Africa and hold political discussions with his hosts.
The German-sponsored fourth Africa Forum of the Partnership with Africa initiative is likely to be overshadowed by fighting between government forces and...
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Croatia should be able to finish all talks on joining the EU by the end of 2009, paving the way for it to enter the bloc as early as 2011, the EU's executive body said Wednesday.
"Croatia is expected to reach the final phase of accession negotiations by the end of 2009 if it has taken the necessary preparatory steps," the...
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Croatia should be able to finish all talks on joining the EU by the end of 2009, paving the way for it to enter the bloc as early as 2011, the EU's executive body said Wednesday.
"Croatia is expected to reach the final phase of accession negotiations by the end of 2009 if it has taken the necessary preparatory steps," the...
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The four parties that will form the next Lithuanian coalition government launched talks in the capital, Vilnius, Tuesday aimed at drawing up a program for their four-year term.
Nine days after their first informal get-together on election night, the four leaders are believed to be formalising their alliance by means of two documents:...
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The violent disintegration of Yugoslavia - the fragmentation, corruption and shadowy political interests - have spawned a ruthlessly efficient, unbiased and deadly network of organized crime spanning the entire Balkans, experts warn.
A Croatian criminal may kill as a favour to Serbian partner. He may then pass the tab to a Montenegrin...
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Legislators of the opposition Likud party asked Israel's attorney-general Friday to examine whether interim Prime Minister Ehud Olmert as the head of a transitional government has the authority to continue peace negotiations with Syria.
Likud legislator Yuval Steinitz said Olmert, by conducting talks with Syria as an outgoing...
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The newly-elected head of the Polish football federation (PZPN) faced criticism Friday that he wouldn't rid the sport of corruption.
Former Polish football great Grzegorz Lato replaced Michal Listkiewicz as president of the ailing PZPN on Thursday, promising to "clear" the sport of corruption. He also needs to fully overcome...
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Israeli President Shimon Peres gave the green light Monday for the country to hold new elections, telling parliament that consultations he had held with political parties led him to conclude that no legislator had enough backing to form a coalition government.
The president had completed the consultations earlier Monday, a day after...
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A Bulgarian court on Monday launched a trial against 9 people accused of embezzling millions from European Union aid funds.
The defendants were accused of stealing 14 million leva (9.6 million dollars) from funds made available to Bulgaria by the EU as part of the SAPARD (Special Accession Programme for Agriculture and Rural...
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Almost two years after joining the European Union, Bulgaria has passed legislation designed to control conflicts in interest for politicians and officials.
The law was passed Thursday by Bulgaria's parliament. It requires that Bulgaria's president, legislators and administration members, as well as mayors and judges, provide regular...
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Despite a 13-year, multi-billion-dollar international peacekeeping and development effort in Bosnia, Western officials now openly admit it: the divided country is stuck in a blind alley and nobody sees the way out.
The disappointment, the most severe since the end of the 1992-95 war, now runs in the open. The European Union's...
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Three people were detained in southwestern Poland on Wednesday as part of an investigation into corruption in Polish football, local media reported.
A coach and two football officials were detained on a total of 30 charges in Wroclaw and are suspected of paying out bribes in the amount of some 100,000 zlotys (39,652...
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Israeli Prime Minister Ehud Olmert is due in Moscow on Monday for sensitive talks on Iran's nuclear programme and Russian arms sales to Syria, as Moscow seeks to keep a role in Middle East peace process despite the diplomatic fallout over its war with Georgia.
Olmert, who is making the visit despite his resignation two weeks ago amid...
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Serbian police arrested the mayor of an affluent town and prominent politician from President Boris Tadic's party in a crackdown on organized crime, local reports said Wednesday.
Goran Knezevic, two-time mayor of Zrenjanin since 2006, was arrested along with several other suspects allegedly involved in rigging tenders for public...
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Slovenians voted in parliamentary elections Sunday with centre-right Prime Minister Janez Jansa seeking a new four-year term after facing down corruption allegations.
Polls showed the race between Jansa's Slovenian Democratic Party (SDS) and the opposition Social Democrats (SD) too close to call. Both sides were polling 25-30 per cent...
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Spain may be engaging in some pre-match mental warfare ahead of Friday's start of the Davis Cup quarter-final tie against the US, with Rafael Nadal reported to be suffering with fatigue after a long season.
High altitude in Madrid on a clay court laid inside a bull ring will balance the tie, according to Spanish captain Emilio Sanchez...
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When General David Petraeus took over as commander of US forces in Iraq 19 months ago, the country was on the brink of civil war.
More than 3,000 US soldiers had died since the invasion of March 2003 and al-Qaeda terrorists had made the western province of Anbar their regional centre of operations.
With a new strategy that included...
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Former Colombian presidential candidate Ingrid Betancourt, who was held hostage for six years by the Revolutionary Armed Forces of Colombia (FARC), was Wednesday awarded the Prince of Asturias Prize, regarded as the Spanish equivalent of the Nobel.
Betancourt, who was rescued in a spectacular operation in July, was granted the award...
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Taking a tough line on the bribery scandal that has shaken conglomerate Siemens, Germany's top appeal court ruled Friday that it was a crime to set up a slush fund.
It instructed a lower court to hear anew a case against two executives who misappropriated corporate money to bribe managers at Italian electricity company Enel into...
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Romania's parliament Tuesday voted to lift prosecution immunity for Labour Minister Paul Pacuraru and former economics minister Codrut Seres who are the target of corruption investigations.
Both politicians, who are also members of the upper chamber, now face possible prosecution on corruption charges. Additionally, Seres is suspected...
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Bulgaria said Thursday it would itself pay for projects which the European Union has refused to finance over corruption suspicions.
"We have the right to finance projects with national means," Deputy Premier Meglena Plugchieva, who is tasked with bringing the handling of EU aid funds into order, said.
Because of...
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Bulgaria will seek to rely on its own surplus
budget after the European Union cut off almost 500 million euros in aid
to the country over Sofia's shortcomings to halt corruption, local
media reported Monday. The Socialist-led coalition which also
includes the liberal NMS and the ethnic-Turkish dominated MRF decided
at a weekend...
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Italian President Giorgio Napolitano met with
Russia's ruling duo president Dmitry Medvedev and Premier Vladimir
Putin in Moscow Wednesday for talks a Kremlin spokesman said would
focus on international diplomacy, as Italy assumes the G8 presidency
next year. 'In the discussions on international affairs,
particular attention was...
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 Kosovo’s parliament voted 109-0
yesterday in favor of breaking up connections with Serbia, presenting a declaration of
independence that caused the meeting of the emergency Security Council.
Serbia
expressed its strong opposition to the decision of the newly-formed European
state, and it was supported by Russia,
which...
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 Italy’s Prime
Minister Romano Prodi is trying to cope with a crisis that gripped his
government and appealed to a parliamentary vote of confidence.
The country is anxiously expecting the vote’s outcome after a
key ally resigned and the centre-left government began shaking.
Many Italians, including the president himself, were...
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Russian prosecutors have opened an investigation which is expected to
disqualify presidential opposition candidate Mikhail Kasyanov for
allegedly forging the signatures he needed to run, Interfax news agency
reported Tuesday.
Former prime minister Kasyanov said any move to block his joining the ballot was a case of "political...
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 Italian Prime Minister Romano Prodi, whose government is seriously
weakened by the defection of a key ally, on Tuesday dismissed
opposition calls for his resignation and asked parliament to decide his
political fate through a vote of confidence.
Prodi, in an impassioned 20-minute speech frequently interrupted by
heckling from the...
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 Italian Justice Minister Clemente Mastella confirmed Thursday his
decision to resign in the wake of his wife's house arrest, but said his
party would continue supporting Italy's shaky governing coalition.
"I'm resigning to defend my honour," Mastella said during a rowdy
midday news conference which along with reporters...
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 The Kosovo parliament on Wednesday backed the new Prime Minister Hashim
Thaci, President Fatmir Sejdiu and their government built on promises
of independence and closer alignment with the West.
"We are ready to turn Kosovo into an independent, sovereign state
in the first part of the year," Thaci said before the vote....
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 Ukraine's parliament on Tuesday elected reformer Yulia Tymoshenko as prime minister.
The Ukrainian legislature the Verhovna Rada used an unprecedented
roll-call vote to make the decision. The motion carried by a razor-thin
majority of one vote with 226 in favour, in the 450-seat house.
The Rada sacked the previous pro-Russia...
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 Poland wants to rebuild its relationship with the EU and Russia, but it
will withdraw all 900 of its troops from Iraq by the end of 2008, new
Prime Minister Donald Tusk said in his first address to the Polish
parliament on Friday.
"We will conduct this operation keeping in mind that our commitment
to our ally, the United...
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 A French judge on Wednesday ruled that there was enough evidence to
open an investigation against former president Jacques Chirac for
corruption, a spokeswoman for a Paris court said.
Following several hours of questioning on Wednesday, the judge,
Xaviere Simioni, placed Chirac under formal investigation on the charge
of...
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 According to local police officials, Georgian police were
forced to use teargas and water cannons to dispel opposition demonstrators
staging a sixth day of protests in the capital, Tbilisi.Several people were injured during the clash on the city's
main street in front of parliament.The protesters had been regrouping after an earlier...
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Taiwan prosecutors said Friday that they will probe money laundering charges against ex-president Lee Teng-hui.
Prosecution spokesman Chen Yun-nan said that former president Chen Shui-bian, who is charged with corruption and pending trial, provided information about Lee's alleged money laundering.
Lee was Taiwan's president from...
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The Vietnamese National Assembly's Standing Committee has rejected removing the death penalty for corruption, fearing crime may increase without a strong deterrent, NA deputies said Wednesday.
The next session of the NA in May will see the standing committee summarize its decision and present it. The standing committee decides what...
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The new Thai government will lose the goodwill of the nation if it cannot head off massive job losses next year, said Finance Minister Korn Chatikavanij Tuesday.
The cabinet informally approved a spending boost of up to 180 billion baht (5.5 billion dollars) at its first meeting, one day after the commerce minister reported that...
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The new Thai government will lose the goodwill of the nation if it cannot head off massive job losses next year, said Finance Minister Korn Chatikavanij Tuesday.
The cabinet informally approved a spending boost of up to 180 billion baht (5.5 billion dollars) at its first meeting, one day after the commerce minister reported that...
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Afghan President Hamid Karzai said on Thursday that unnecessary detentions and house-searches of Afghan people would damage the legitimacy of his government and asked NATO-led international forces to respect the laws and culture of Afghanistan.
"Entering by force to our people's houses is against the government of...
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Malaysia's law minister on Tuesday introduced a witness protection programme in Parliament as part of efforts to protect whistle-blowers in corruption and criminal cases.
Nazri Abdul Aziz presented the proposed legislation, which would provide accommodation and a new identity to those accepted as witnesses.
Under the bill,...
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Corruption cases in Hong Kong fell by 5 per cent in the first 11 months of 2008 despite the city's ailing economy, anti-graft investigators said Tuesday.
However, the former British colony's Independent Commission Against Corruption said it was bracing itself for a new wave of sophisticated financial crime as the global economic...
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Thailand's Parliament opened an extraordinary session Monday to vote in a new prime minister after the last premier and much of the cabinet lost their posts in a court ruling.
The vote was expected to be close between the two nominated candidates, Democrat Party leader Abhisit Vejjajiva and the Puea Paendin Party's leader, police...
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Thailand's Parliament on Monday selected Democrat Party leader Abhisit Vejjajiva as the next prime minister, giving the 44-year-old Oxford-educated politician a slim majority to form the next government.
An extraordinary session of the lower house gave Abhisit a thin victory by a 235-198 vote over his rival, police General Pracha...
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Thailand's Parliament on Monday selected Democrat Party leader Abhisit Vejjajiva as the next prime minister, giving the 44-year-old Oxford-educated politician a slim majority to form the next government.
An extraordinary session of the lower house gave Abhisit a thin victory by a 235-198 vote over his rival, police General Pracha...
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Thousands of people took to the streets in the Philippine capital on Friday to protest efforts to amend the constitution that would extend the term of scandal-tainted President Gloria Macapagal Arroyo.
The rally at Manila's financial district of Makati City was the biggest demonstration so far to denounce moves by Arroyo's allies in...
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Taiwan's former president Chen Shui-bian was indicted on corruption charges Friday, becoming the first president to be charged in Taiwan's history.
Prosecutor Chen Yun-nan announced that Chen was indicted on charges of embezzlement, receiving bribes and money laundering, allegedly committed during his two terms from...
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More than 1,000 people confronted at least 300 Chinese riot police on Friday after they were angered by alleged vote-buying in a village election, a rights group reported.
About 50 villagers were injured and police detained some 200 protestors after the riot on Friday morning in Pingyao county in the northern province of Shanxi,...
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Malaysian Prime Minister Abdullah Ahmad Badawi on Wednesday proposed a much-anticipated anti-corruption bill and another bill to restore integrity to the country's judiciary.
The Malaysian Anti-Corruption Commission bill, aimed to take effect in January, was aimed at stamping out corruption in the public and private...
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Anti-corruption investigators have successfully prosecuted 50 chairmen and top managers for scams totalling 3 billion Hong Kong dollars (385 million US dollars) over the last five years, a media report said Tuesday.
The Independent Commission Against Corruption said 18 cases involving 2.5 billion Hong Kong dollars concerned fraud...
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US president-elect Barack Obama telephoned Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas and promised him that his administration would continue efforts to advance the peace process between Israel and the Palestinians.
Palestinian negotiator Saeb Erekat said in a statement sent to reporters overnight that in Tuesday's telephone conversation,...
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Thailand's fugitive former premier Thaksin Shinawatra has decided not to appeal an abuse-of-power conviction that carries a two-year jail sentence and has turned him in to a divorced, wandering exile, his lawyer confirmed Tuesday.
On October 21, the Supreme Court for Political Office Holders found Thaksin guilty of abusing his...
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State-run China Central Television, the country's main national broadcaster, has suspended its live coverage of the Chinese Super League after the latest in a series of scandals to hit the ailing league, reports said on Tuesday.
A mass brawl at the end of last Wednesday's match between Beijing Guo'an and Tianjin Kangshifu was...
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Thailand's fugitive former premier Thaksin Shinawatra is in Dubai, from where he will address his supporters on December 10, a colleague of his said Monday.
The host of the Truth Today talk show, Jaturporn Promphan, who is also a member of parliament in what is considered Thaksin's proxy political party, said the former premier will...
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Thailand's fugitive former premier Thaksin Shinawatra is in Dubai, from where he will address his supporters on December 10, a colleague of his said Monday.
The host of the Truth Today talk show, Jaturporn Promphan, who is also a member of parliament in what is considered Thaksin's proxy political party, said the former premier will...
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Israeli caretaker Prime Minister Ehud Olmert and Palestinian President Mahmoud Abbas met in Jerusalem Monday, with a collapsing Gaza truce high on their agenda.
The two leaders have been meeting regularly since they revived Israeli-Palestinian peace negotiations for the first time in seven years at an international summit in...
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Israeli police questioned caretaker Prime Minister Ehud Olmert Friday for the 10th time in recent months on corruption suspicions.
Police arrived at Olmert's Jerusalem residence in the morning and probed him for 2.5 hours, police spokesman Micky Rosenfeld said.
He said fraud detectives questioned him on suspicions that he funneled...
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Israeli caretaker prime minister Ehud Olmert wants to start direct negotiations with Syria by January, an Israeli newspaper reported Friday.
Olmert wants to upgrade the talks despite internal criticism by members of both the opposition and coalition, who say he lacks the legitimacy to negotiate during his final months in...
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Taiwan's former president Chen Shui-bian has gone on a hunger strike to protest against his detention over a corruption probe, as Taiwan's High Court upheld a seven-year prison sentence against his son-in-law, officials said Thursday.
"The ex-president has stopped eating since he was placed under custody at the Taipei...
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A Chinese legal activist on Thursday said he had been freed from police custody after being held for nearly two weeks to prevent him from advising candidates and voters in local elections.
Yao Lifa said police in the central province of Hubei released him on Wednesday night because his wife had become seriously ill during his what he...
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