Oct 19, 2012
How To Fight Fraud in Europe
Can investigative journalism be instrumental in the detection of and fight against corruption and fraud with EU funds, and if so, how?
Can investigative journalism be instrumental in the detection of and fight against corruption and fraud with EU funds, and if so, how?
Carlos Dada investigates corruption in one of the deadliest regions of the world for independent journalists: Central America. In his Anna Politkovskaya Award acceptance speech he questions the role of the journalist and why we practice in such risky environments.
MEXICO: During a 1997 training exercise, candidates for an elite Mexican military unit, the Air-Mobile Special Forces Groups, were divided into two teams. Team A was packed into a truck and ambushed by Team B, which took prisoners. The methods used by Team B members to extract information from their captured rivals were not exactly in line with international law. "They were beaten," said one former officer who observed the training. "They were smothered by putting a plastic bag on their heads; they were hit with sticks on the soles of their feet." The interrogation went on, he told ICIJ, "until they managed to escape."
COLOMBIA: Putumayo, a vast, rainforest-carpeted province in southern Colombia, is the main military target of the $1.3 billion U.S. aid package known as Plan Colombia. Coca grown in the region provides 40 percent of the cocaine sold in the United States, according to the U.S. Drug Enforcement Administration. Pilots working for DynCorp, a major U.S. government military contractor, spray poison on the coca of Putumayo, while U.S.-trained assault troops secure the area for the fumigation raids. But there are other forces operating here, as well.
WASHINGTON: At a Senate Armed Services Committee hearing on March 5, 1998, Gen. Charles E. Wilhelm, then head of the U.S. Southern Command, laid out the rationale for a large-scale U.S. military aid program unfolding for Colombia.
How to work stories in oppressive regimes: sometimes the answer is less complicated than you might think.
A New York judge has postponed a civil trial that would have delved into how a major player in the global trade in human tissue obtains skin, bones and other body parts that are recycled into medical devices.
There is no democracy without efficient institutions and too many journalists passively accept this, says Portuguese investigative journalist and "troublemaker" Rui Araujo.
There were several important developments in recent days linked to our exposure of the international trade in human tissues. Here's how investigative reporters can work together to produce better journalism and effect change.
One of the biggest players in the global trade in human tissue has suspended its partnership with suppliers in Ukraine, where authorities have carried out multiple investigations over allegations of illegal tissue recovery.