December 9th marks the anticorruption day worldwide established by the United Nations Convention Against Corruption. It is important to remember each year the vast amounts of money involved in corruption worldwide and the consequence it brings to economies and societies. 

More than 2.6 trillion dollars (5% of the global GDP) are stolen through generalized corruption. The fight against corruption in all of its forms is a fight for development and human rights. It deteriorates societies and stops economic development at the expense of the enrichment of few. 

The case of Venezuela visualizes the amount of deteriorating power corruption has. Transparencia Venezuela, a Venezuelan NGO, has stated in its many analysis that without doubt the economic collapse of the country, which has affected more than 5 million Venezuelans who have conducted forced migration,  is directly linked to massive amounts of corruption cases involving tens if not hundreds of billions of dollars. It is as clear as possible that corruption will directly or indirectly affect the society as a whole. 

Corruption must be fought first of all with the education countries give to their respective societies. A society that understands what the impact it has to everyone else and that if one is involved in any form of corruption the rest cannot continue to economically develop, will condemn these acts and the same will continuously drop. We must educate our societies to condemn corruption in all of its forms which are included bribery, embezzlement, money laundering, obstruction of justice and many more. 

Corruption deteriorates the pillars of democracies and rule of law around the world. From governmental instability, to the creation of bureaucratic structures with the sole purpose of implementing bribery mechanisms and even the monopolization of the democratic organs countries have. 

Currently, the HRI for peace and freedom is working within all of its means to stop corruption at a global scale. The tool we promote is the Global Magnitsky Act and the intention is to implement it on Europe and eventually in many other regions of the world. Countries that have implemented the G.M.A such as the United States of America and Canada have become significantly more efficient at imposing individual sanctions to perpetrators of human rights and entities involved in corruption cases. We encourage to visit our webpage and read what the  HRI Magnitsky Program is about.