GACC Events Tackle Trade Sanction Evasion
Historic trade sanctions against Russia have prompted an equally historic rise in illicit activity and elaborate cross-border schemes that perpetuate both kleptocracy and war. With the aim of helping defund Russia’s war effort, GACC recently brought together civil society experts and investigative journalists to share knowledge and develop new ideas.
Unlike money laundering, sanction evasion in international trade leaves multiple traces in the public domain, which makes it possible to detect, but not so easy to enforce. Journalists are on the forefront of this effort, producing crucial accounts of sanction evasion and its profiteers. Interactions with sanctions experts can help direct and improve this reporting, as sanction evasion and enforcement both continue to evolve.
To provide opportunities for these exchanges, GACC organized two events around the International Anti-Corruption Conference (IACC), hosted in Vilnius in June.
The IACC panel, “Feeding The Russian War Machine: Lessons Learned from Investigating Cross-Border Sanction Evasion,” featured five journalists from the OCCRP network, presenting on investigative tactics and findings, as well as how secrecy, politics and corruption are impeding enforcement. From attaching tracking devices to luxury cars to unpacking cotton pulp supply chains, they brought to life their experiences of reporting on Belarus, Central Asia, Finland, Latvia and Lithuania.
GACC also organized a related workshop on “Investigating Trade Sanction Evasion” on the sidelines of the conference. Forty journalists and civil society experts from 12 countries gathered for the full-day event which aimed to provide journalists with the connections, expertise and ideas needed to produce further investigations about Russia and Belarus sectoral sanctions, and generate ideas for how GACC and partners can accelerate the real-world impact of these investigations. The proceedings revealed common challenges faced by journalists working on this topic, such as audience fatigue and data gaps, and identified practical strategies and under-covered topics which will inform the group’s future work.
