March 30, 2018: ROC’s Initial Report under the United Nations Convention against Corruption is Published and ROC will Hold an International Review Meeting and Strive to Prevent and Fight Corruption with Other Countries around the World

The United Nations Convention against Corruption (UNCAC) was promulgated on September 7, 2016, and after more than one year, Taiwan has finished the Initial Report under UNCAC. We combined Executive Yuan, Judicial Yuan, Control Yuan, and 27 subordinate organizations to carry out a comprehensive review of our implementation of UNCAC. After 21 domestic checks and finalization meetings, the first national Report was completed, and the contents of the Report were released on March 30, 2019, and have been published on the https://www.aac.moj.gov.tw/5791/.

UNCAC includes the mechanism of preventing corruption, conviction and enforcement, international cooperation, and the recovery of proceeds from illegal proceeds to encourage all countries in the world to work together on anti-corruption. Taiwan proactively complies with the international rules and conduct comprehensive self-examination. The Initial Report under UNCAC responded to the legal and systemic requirement article by article and put forward implementation statistics data and significant cases from the past five years to highlight Taiwan’s strongpoints and efficiencies concerning the Convention's implementation.

The amendment of the Money Laundering Control Act in 2016 demands public and private sectors to prevent money laundering and expand the range of confiscation. All of these actively respond to the Convention's requirements for anti-money laundering and eradicating illicit money flow. Regarding the prevention of private sector corruption, the Executive Yuan has forwarded the amendment of the Company Act and the draft of the Foundations Act to the Legislative Yuan to review. The draft of the Mutual Assistance in Criminal Matters Act has been submitted to the Legislative Yuan, and the Extradition Law studied by MOJ to establish a more comprehensive legal basis of international cooperation, and recover illegal proceeds from crimes more effectively and timely and help extradition of criminals.

To follow the trend of international anti-corruption legislation, through the comprehensive examination of various agencies, the Initial Report proposed the combination of the Anti-Corruption Act and offenses of Malfeasance in the Criminal Code of the Republic of China, considering the introduction of trading in influence, studying whistle-blower protection, the private sector bribery legal system, and the criminal liability and accountability mechanism of legal persons. The Report is consistent with the resolution of the Meeting on National judicial reform. MOJ and relevant agencies actively promote legislation or amendments to the law and regularly explain the progress.

UNCAC takes two steps to review the implementation situation of all the state parties. The first step is to check the third and fourth chapters of UNCAC from 2010 to 2015, and the second step is to check the second and fifth chapters from 2015 to 2020. Of 183 state parties, 162 have finished the first step of review, and only four have completed the second step. To be able to synchronize with the international, Taiwan invited experts to review our Report by international standards from 21 to 24 of August in 2018. The five members of the international review committee asked for the Meeting are all important figures in the international anti-corruption field, including the former chairman of Transparency International José Ugaz. A one-time review of all the provisions of UNCAC is a global initiative. Taiwan is keen to show the world its determination and execution ability to implement clean government and welcomes social organizations to propose parallel opinions and advice to the international review committee.

Through publishing and international review of the initial Report under UNCAC, it encourages legal system and policies in line with international rules and helps promote the supervision of anti-corruption from communities and work with countries around the world to prevent and combat corruption. Wish Taiwan has closer network link with international anti-corruption and launch a new page to construct a clean government.