GRECO

The Group of States against Corruption (GRECO) was established in 1999 by the Council of Europe to monitor member States' compliance with the organisation's anti-corruption standards.                                      

GRECO aims to improve its members' capacity to fight corruption by ensuring, through a dynamic process of mutual evaluation and peer pressure, that they comply with the Council of Europe's anti-corruption standards. It helps to identify gaps in national anti-corruption policies and therefore encourages States to make the necessary legislative, institutional and practical reforms. GRECO is also a forum for sharing best practices in the prevention and detection of corruption.

GRECO is based in Strasbourg, with a Secretariat headed by its Executive Secretary, appointed by the Secretary General of the Council of Europe.

GRECO evaluates all its members equally, through a dynamic process of mutual peer review and peer pressure. GRECO is scrupulously committed to the principle of equal rights and obligations among its members. All members participate and submit to unrestricted mutual evaluation and compliance procedures.

GRECO monitoring includes:

• A "horizontal" evaluation procedure (all members are evaluated as part of an Evaluation round) leads to recommendations that aim to achieve the necessary reforms in the legislative, institutional, and practical fields
• A compliance procedure, the aim of which is to evaluate the measures taken by members to implement these recommendations. 

GRECO proceeds in cycles, called "evaluation rounds", each covering specific themes

The evaluation procedure follows well-defined stages, starting with the appointment by GRECO of a team of evaluators responsible for the evaluation of a pre-selected member State. An analysis of the situation in each country is carried out on the basis of responses to a questionnaire and information gathered during meetings with representatives of the civil service and civil society during on-site visits. After the evaluation visit, the team of evaluators draws up a draft report which is sent to the country evaluated for feedback, before being submitted to GRECO for consideration and approval. The conclusions of evaluation reports may establish that legislation and practice comply - or do not comply - with the provisions examined. The conclusions generally lead to recommendations that require a response within 18 months, or to observations that member States are invited to take into account but are not obliged to report during the subsequent compliance procedure.

One of the strengths of GRECO's monitoring lies in the fact that the implementation of recommendations is examined under the compliance procedure. The assessment as to whether a recommendation has been satisfactorily, partially or unsatisfactorily implemented is based on a situation report supplemented by related documents submitted by the member State evaluated, 18 months after the evaluation report was adopted. In cases where not all recommendations have been complied with, GRECO re-examines the recommendations concerned after an additional period of 18 months. Compliance reports and their addenda adopted by GRECO also contain a general conclusion on the implementation of all recommendations, the purpose being to decide whether or not the compliance procedure has been terminated with regard to a member State in question. Finally, GRECO's Rules of Procedure provide for the opening of a special procedure, based on a progressive approach, with regard to members whose implementation of GRECO's recommendations has been deemed unsatisfactory overall.

Evaluation by GRECO involves gathering information through a questionnaire(s), together with country visits that enable the evaluation teams to request additional information through interviews with the main high-level national stakeholders and to draft evaluation reports. These reports, which are examined and approved by GRECO, contain recommendations for the countries evaluated to implement the provisions in question as satisfactorily as possible. The measures taken to implement the recommendations are subsequently evaluated by GRECO in a separate compliance procedure.

To date, GRECO has launched five evaluation rounds covering specific provisions of the twenty guidelines (and related provisions of the Criminal Law Convention on Corruption).

List of assessment and compliance reports for Monaco

​​​​​The fifth evaluation round for the Principality is still to come. The prevention of corruption and the promotion of integrity within central government (senior executive functions) and law enforcement agencies will be addressed through:

• Ethical principles and rules of conduct
• Conflict of interest
• Prohibition or restriction of certain activities
• Declaration of assets, income, liabilities and interests
• Enforcement of the rules regarding conflicts of interest
• Awareness