Russia moves to Phase 3 of the assessment of implementation of the OECD Anti-Bribery Convention

The Russian Federation remained in the second phase of monitoring the implementation of the OECD Convention for more than six years. The first report on this phase of the Convention's implementation, published by the Working Group in October 2013, contained 50 recommendations on bringing the Russian Federation's regulatory framework into line with the provisions of the Convention, which the country must implement in order to move on to the next phase.

As a matter of priority, Russia needed to take the following measures to prevent bribery of foreign public officials:

criminalize the promise and offer of bribes to foreign public officials;
strengthen the legal basis for holding legal entities liable for bribery of foreign public officials;
involve law enforcement agencies in actively investigating crimes related to the bribery of foreign public officials;
develop measures providing for the seizure and confiscation by court order of assets obtained as a result of corrupt activities abroad from individuals and legal entities;
tighten liability for bribery abroad for Russian individuals and legal entities operating internationally.

However, the process of addressing shortcomings in legislation has been significantly delayed: by 2016, the country had fully implemented only 10 of the 50 recommendations, with another 10 partially implemented. Due to the lack of visible progress, the Working Group required Russia to report on the implementation of the recommendations every six months and conducted several reassessments of their implementation.

In April 2019, when most of the recommendations had already been implemented by the Russian Federation, the Working Group organized a high-level mission to Moscow to discuss the implementation of the remaining measures with representatives of the Russian authorities. Following the mission, the Russian side undertook to submit a detailed report containing information on the laws adopted and the progress of consideration of draft laws aimed at implementing the key recommendations of the OECD experts by June 2019.

To date, Russia has implemented the following measures in accordance with these recommendations:

Federal Law No. 382-FZ of December 5, 2017, "On Amendments to the Federal Law "On Enforcement Proceedings," regulating the procedure for disposing of property confiscated by a judgment or decision of a foreign court, was adopted;
Federal Law No. 387-FZ of December 5, 2017, "On Amending the Criminal Procedure Code of the Russian Federation," was adopted, establishing the procedure for recognizing and enforcing judgments and other decisions of foreign courts in relation to the confiscation of proceeds obtained by criminal means;
Federal Law No. 530-FZ of December 27, 2018, "On Amendments to the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation and the Criminal Procedure Code of the Russian Federation," was adopted, providing for tougher penalties for falsification of financial institutions' reports, as well as amending the Criminal Procedure Code of the Russian Federation to reduce the time limits for seizure of property and regulate the actions of law enforcement agencies in cases where such property is located in a foreign state;
Federal Law No. 570-FZ of December 27, 2018, "On Amending Article 19.28 of the Code of the Russian Federation on Administrative Offenses," which expands the scope of Article 19.28 of the Code of Administrative Offenses of the Russian Federation to ensure that legal entities can be held administratively liable in cases where the offense is committed in the interests of third parties, and also clarifies the circle of persons who may act on behalf of the bribe-taker.

In addition, representatives of the Russian Federation reported on the start of work on investigating crimes in the sphere of bribery of foreign officials: the lack of relevant law enforcement practice has repeatedly been criticized by OECD experts.

The Working Group welcomed the measures taken by the Russian Federation to address shortcomings in its legislation and expressed its readiness to move the country to Phase 3 of the Convention implementation assessment, provided that Russia implements the recommendations with the highest priority:

- establishing criminal liability for promising and offering bribes to foreign officials as separate criminal offenses (the relevant bill No. 235984-7 was already submitted to the State Duma in 2017),

- exclusion from the Criminal Code of the Russian Federation of the possibility of exemption from criminal liability in connection with active repentance in the case of bribery of a foreign official.

The Russian Federation must fully implement these recommendations by October 2020, after which the Working Group will begin the third phase of monitoring in accordance with the schedule.

Monitoring of states' compliance with the provisions of the Convention is carried out by the Working Group and consists of four main phases. During the first phase, changes in legislation undertaken by the state to ensure compliance of the legal framework with the provisions of the Convention are assessed; During the second phase, the structures designed to implement this legislation in practice are analyzed, and the implementation of the recommendations received at the end of the first phase is reviewed. During the third phase, law enforcement and the implementation of the recommendations made in the second phase are assessed. During the fourth phase, the same issues are considered in relation to the specific characteristics of the state.

The Russian Federation ratified the OECD Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials in International Business Transactions in 2012 and completed the first phase of monitoring its implementation by 2013.