Saakashvili repeats false claim on corruption at EPP congress

December 11, 2009 by georgiamedia

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Mikheil Saakashvili repeated his false- and nonsensical - claim about Transparency International's evaluation of Georgia's record on fighting corruption at yesterday's congress of the centre-right European People's Party congress in Bonn.

He told the congress, attended by the majority of the European Union's heads of government: "According to data recently released by Transparency International, Georgia is first in the world in terms of fighting corruption."

This is the second time this week that Mikheil Saakashvili has made this claim - but it simply is not true.

Transparency International have explicitly rejected such a claim saying it "would not be proper".

In any case the most recent figures released by Transparency International show Georgia's pace of improvement has slowed and the country with the biggest increase in its anti-corruption score over the last five years is Dominica in the Caribbean.

Georgia undoubtedly has done much to tackle petty and widespread corruption in recent years - but concerns about the wider misuse of state power and resources is growing rather than diminishing.

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