Transparency International recently published a new edition of its most representative global research, the Corruption Perception Index (CPI) for the past year 2022. Not unexpectedly, BiH has not only regressed again, but finds itself in the select global company of countries that are declining fastest due to the dramatic rise in corruption.
BiH is ranked worst in the Western Balkans region and in third worst position in Europe, right behind Ukraine and Russia. For those interested in statistical details, BiH has a score of 34 on a scale from 0 to 100 (where 0 is the worst score) and is ranked 110th alongside Sierra Leone, Malawi, and Gambia.
Transparency International’s Corruption Perception Index is no exception. For more than a decade, BiH has been in
You can already guess that BiH has no strategy or policy for fighting corruption in response to all this. BiH’s political and judicial elite are stars of international, American, British, and other blacklists precisely because of corruption. This, of course, has never been sufficient for the judiciary in BiH to prosecute any of them. The most witty among them were even on oversight committees for the work of the Agency for Prevention and Coordination of Anti-Corruption.
This year’s Corruption Perception Index report particularly emphasizes the direct link between corruption, especially its most severe form of state capture, with political instability, institutional devastation, strengthening of authoritarian tendencies, and systematic violation of human rights. This toxic symbiosis is extremely fertile ground for another horseman of the apocalypse – organized crime.
In recent years, an increasing number of international institutions and organizations, from intelligence and police agencies to academic and media organizations, have been dealing with the problem of organized crime in the Western Balkans. The complete devastation of the institutional framework, law enforcement agencies and judiciary, as well as the large number of different agencies with overlapping BiH jurisdictions, makes it an ideal stronghold for organized crime.
More than two years ago, the wider BiH public became acquainted with the now well-known encrypted applications “Sky” and “ANOM” used by criminal groups. According to media reports, the former Minister of Internal Affairs of RS stated that more than 2,000 citizens possessed this application. According to media reports, more than one hundred members of law enforcement agencies from 14 agencies are covered by investigations, including judges, prosecutors, lawyers, and politicians.
So far, no one has been convicted. Judging by the results of the judiciary’s work so far, it is unlikely that anyone will be. One does not need to be a great expert to conclude that this data is only the tip of the iceberg and that the situation in law enforcement agencies is in a terminal phase.
Of course, law enforcement institutions and judiciary paralyzed by corruption, in the context of complete capture of the political system, cannot be an equal opponent to organized crime. Simply because the network of organized crime reaches to the highest levels of power.
The previously mentioned research shows a dramatic trend of decline lasting more than a decade. Articulating an effective response to such a situation by exclusively internal forces increasingly falls into the realm of science fiction, in the context of increasingly naked authoritarian tendencies, transitional socio-economic desert, and dramatic depopulation. As Ivan Krastev said, people have realized that it is easier to change the country than the government.
Such data should also concern EU countries. The explosive mixture of corruption and organized crime spreads like fire regardless of borders. The destructive effects of organized crime cannot be easily stopped by the Schengen border, especially if it has a safe haven on the other side of the border. Hence, for the EU, the issue of fighting corruption and organized crime in Western Balkan countries is not only a matter from the domain of EU enlargement policy but a matter from the area of internal security of member countries and the EU as a whole.
As someone said long ago, the EU has to choose between the role of exporter of stability or the role of importer of instability.
