Corruption

Mr Justice Tugendhat delivered a ferocious verdict last week. Undercover reporters from the Sunday Times claimed they had found Peter Cruddas, co-Treasurer of the Conservative Party, offering influence in return for wodges of cash. With damning language, the judge found against the paper, leaving it with costs and damages of around £700,000. I don’t want to discuss the merits of the case. Cruddas, who had to resign when the story came out, may have been unjustly maligned. Conversely, the Sunday Times is going to the Court of Appeal, so it may be that the paper is the true victim. I want to look at the judge’s reasoning instead, because it

Part 1 “Russian Justice” A judge at Moscow’s Tverskoi District Court stopped the trial of Sergei Magnitsky (above) yesterday – but not because the defendant was dead. Magnitsky’s demise was of no concern to the judge. It did not bother him in the slightest. The court merely postponed proceedings until 4 March when the world will see something rarely seen since the Middle Ages: a prosecutor arraigning a corpse. The Putin regime – that mixture of autocracy and gangsterism – is desperate to discredit the late Mr Magnitsky and his employer, Bill Browder of Hermitage Capital. If you don’t know the story, I’ll explain why. Browder exposed corruption in Russian

An unemployment rate of 26 per cent (and 56 per cent for young people); an economy that contracted by 0.7 per cent last quarter; tumbling approval ratings. Spanish Prime Minister Mariano Rajoy had enough problems, even before claims that he received about €280,000 (£240,000) in payments from ‘secret’ accounts managed by the treasurers of his People’s Party (the PP). Protestors took to the streets of Madrid last night calling for his resignation. El País (Spain’s biggest newspaper) published hand-written accounts that it claims were kept by PP treasurers Luis Bárcenas and Álvaro Lapuerta between 1990 and 2009. They show donations to the party from businesses (mostly in the construction sector) and

Just a couple of days after Vladimir Putin’s electoral setback, Russian police have arrested a number of protesters, including veteran liberal politician Boris Nemtsov and the popular blogger Alexei Navalny. This is the umpteenth time that Nemtsov, the former deputy prime minister of Russia, has been manhandled by the Russian state. He also spent some time in jail at the beginning of 2011 and was subjected to strenuous treatment. But, it is unusual for Navalny to have been pulled in. He is an activist who’s gained prominence among Russian bloggers and reformers. He is not “Russia’s Erin Brockovich”, as hailed by Time Magazine, and many of his recent remarks contain

After yesterday’s spontaneous clean-up operation on the streets of Cairo, protestors gathered at Freedom Square today to maintain the revolution’s momentum. There have been minor developments, with the army and its interim civilian administration dissolving President Mubarak’s gerrymandered parliament, preparing the way for an election in the future. The timetable for that election remains a mystery – something about which the international community, led by President Obama and assorted European leaders, is questioning without yet expressing concern. Both Britain and the United States, together with the European Union have again reiterated their support for democracy in Egypt, whilst maintaining that the Egyptian military’s conduct has been exemplary so far. Meanwhile, protests and

I’m visiting a stylish but tense Rome today, just as the Italian legislature has voted down a non-confidence vote in Silvio Berlusconi, Italy’s mogul-cum-leader. “Rome is at war” my taxi driver told me and numerous demonstrations are going on. Ill Cavaliere, as Berlusconi is sometimes known, put in a strong defence of his record in the Senate and managed to coax, cajole and, some claim, bribe enough parliamentarians in the Chamber of Deputies to secure a small victory. He pulled not a Full Monty but a “Full Andreotti”, using every trick and tactic in the book (and some scribbled in the margin too). For now, Berlusconi survives and can resume