A Delegation of CASS Law Institute Attends the Seventh Eurasia Anti-Corruption Forum in Russia

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On April 25-26, 2018, a delegation of CASS Law Institute attended the Seventh Eurasia Anti-Corruption Forum in Russia. The seminar, which took “Law and Ethics in Conflicts of Interest” as its theme, was jointly organized by the Comparative Law Institute and the Auditing Administration of the Russian Federation, and the International Anti-Corruption Academy.

The opening ceremony and the keynote speeches of the seminar were held on the morning of April 25. On the afternoon of the same day, Professor Zhou Hanhua and one of his Russian colleagues co-chaired the session on “the prevention and resolution of conflicts of interest between civil servants in central and local state organs”. In the session, Professor Zhou Hanhua, Professor Liu Renwen, Professor Liu Hongyan and their Russian colleagues exchanged views on such issues as the root causes, the manifestations, the consequences of conflicts of interest between civil servants in central and local state organs and the ways of reducing and resolving these conflicts and preventing corruption.

After the session, Professor Liu Renwen and one of his Russian colleagues jointly chaired the roundtable on “Social Supervision in the Prevention of Conflicts of Interest Between China and Russia”. At the roundtable, Professor Zhou Hanhua gave a comprehensive introduction to the historical development, the nature, the functions and powers, the operational mechanisms, the defects and the reform objectives of the discipline inspection and supervision system in China. Professor Liu Renwen introduced the latest developments in anti-corruption criminal legislation in China, including the adjustment of conviction and sentencing standards, the establishment of the system of life imprisonment for the crime of bribery, the creation of the new crime of offering bribes to a person with influence, the abolition of the special voluntary surrender, and the improvement of preventive measures.Professor Liu Hongyangave an introduction to the strategic transition, the construction of the legal system, the current stage of development and the basic direction of future development of the anti-corruption legal system in China.

On the morning of April 26, the Chinese delegation participated in the roundtable “New Anti-Corruption Technologies in Anti-Corruption Legislation in China and Russia”. At the roundtable, Professor Zhou Hanhua gave an introductory speech on behalf of the Chinese delegation, in which he introduced the necessity and the significance of establishing the supervisory system in China, the nature, status, names, composition, term of office, and leadership and work mechanisms of supervision commissions at various levels in China. Professor Liu Renwenexpressed his approval of the transition of the anti-corruption methods from those emphasizing criminal punishment to those emphasizing professional ethics, culture, and social control and answered questions raised by Russian scholars relating to the unit crime and the crime of money laundering in the Chinese Criminal Law.Professor Liu Hongyan raised questions to his Russian colleagues about the Russian legislation on anti-corruption ethics and exchanged opinions with them on jurisprudential issues relating to ethics legislation, the relationship between ethics and traditional law, and the feasibility of ethics legislation.

On the afternoon of April 26, the delegation visited the State and Law Institute of Russian Academy of Sciences and exchanged views with leaders and some staff members of the Information Law Department, the Criminal Law Department and the Ecological Law Department of the Institute on possible fields of cooperation between the two institutes.