Standards and the practice of countering the withdrawal of criminal assets abroad and asset recovery

Abstract

For the first time at the level of international law, the concept of “Asset recovery” was introduced in 2003 by the UN Convention against Corruption. This is the subject of its fifth chapter, which provides two blocks of measures. One hand, they are aimed at countering the withdrawal of criminal assets to foreign jurisdictions through the implementation of state financial control and financial monitoring as its type and method. On the other hand, these are measures aimed at returning illegally transferred assets back to their country of origin using criminal procedural and civil law mechanisms. The Russian Federation gives priority to the application of measures to prevent the withdrawal of criminal assets; some of them are fixed in strategic documents approved by the President of the Russian Federation Vladimir Vladimirovich Putin as: The National Security Strategy, the Economic Security Strategy of the Russian Federation for the period up to 2030, the Concept of Developing a National System for Countering the Legalization (Laundering) of Proceeds from Crime and the Financing of Terrorism. The paper provides mechanisms to counter the withdrawal of criminal assets abroad and asset recovery of the Prosecutor General’s Office of the Russian Federation.