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Ethics And Accountability Essay

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Ethics, Integrity and Accountability in Public Sector: Practice and Lessons Learned in Latvia Aleksejs Loskutovs, Director Corruption Prevention and Combating Bureau Latvia 28 September 2006 (10 min.) The public sector in Latvia has undergone many important changes over the past decade. In mid 1990s Latvian government started a major public administration reform. This reform was one of the cornerstones on Latvia’s way to the European Union, which we joined in May 2004. Latvia made a great effort to develop legal framework that regulates the public sector, as well as relations between the public sector and the citizens. Today legislation in Latvia and internal regulations of different public institutions in various ways cover the principles …show more content…

To ensure that this policy and relevant legislation are actually implemented it was decided to establish a single, specialised anti-corruption body – the Corruption Prevention and Combating Bureau. It was created by law in 2002. The Bureau is fully operational since February 2003. It is an independent institution of public administration with investigatory powers. According to the national anti-corruption policy the Bureau has a wide set of tasks starting with prevention of corruption through control of activities of public officials and financing of political parties, and education of the public to investigation of criminal offences of corruption in the public sector. Despite it is a new institution, the Bureau was recognised in 2005 as one of the most trusted institutions in Latvia. Further to this, Latvia has adopted the law on Prevention of Conflict of Interest in Activities of Public Officials. The purpose of this law is to promote the integrity of public officials, as well as transparency and accountability of the public service. The law provides for restrictions and incompatibilities in situations of combing

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