The journalists of the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) face grave dangers and increasingly difficult challenges in their efforts to expose high-level corruption and government links to organized crime.

As an independent investigative journalism outlet and media development organization, the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) relies heavily on copyright to guarantee correct attribution of our work. This is vital to our journalism and investigative research.

Photo by Kaitlyn Baker on Unsplash

The Swedish Foundation Grävfonden announced its first scholarship program today, funding a one to three month internship with the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP).

Erik Palm, Grävfonden

The cold-blooded murder of Slovak investigative journalist Jan Kuciak was also a cold slap across the face of modern Europe. That the public watchdogs -- the beloved members of a profession that is sometimes more reviled than admired -- could be halted simply by a brutal act of violence seems to portend a further breakdown of European values. There has been much handwringing about what to do.

Jan Kuciak

As soon as journalists published the last investigation of their murdered colleague, Slovak reporter Jan Kuciak, they immediately focused on another important issue: Why was he killed? And how did his killers know that he was working on a story about them?

The Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project condemns a raid at the offices of Botswana’s Center for Investigative Journalism (INK) and the harassment of Joel Konopo, a founding and managing partner of the center.

Joel Konopo

Jaroslav Strnad, the chief financial backer of the Czech president, has been secretly snapping up arms stockpiles and factories throughout the Balkans with the help of a cast of notorious local characters. The buy-up has included tens of millions of rounds of old ammunition of a type so unreliable that a previous attempt to sell it inspired a Hollywood movie.

Philippines President Rodrigo Duterte is the Person of the Year for 2017, according to the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP), an organization that has for six years recognized the individual who has done the most in the world to advance organized criminal activity and corruption.

Rodrigo Duterte (Credit: Wikimedia Commons)

 Corruption is everywhere. An estimated $1 trillion is paid in bribes and another $2.6 trillion is stolen worldwide every year, according to the United Nations. These incredible sums make up five percent of the world’s economy. And they mostly come out of the pockets of the poorest of the more than seven billion inhabitants of our planet.

The Organised Crime and Corruption Reporting Project, Daily Maverick, amaBhungane Centre for Investigative Journalism and Platform for the Protection of Whistleblowers in Africa have launched today an online facility for sharing a large data trove at the centre of an international corruption and money laundering scandal.

The Paradise Papers is a major new leak of documents from two offshore services firms based in Bermuda and Singapore, as well as from 19 corporate registries maintained by governments in secret offshore jurisdictions. The documents were obtained by the Süddeutsche Zeitung and shared with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ), which organized a collaborative investigation with dozens of outlets across the world, including the Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP).​

Three years after I investigated bogus international awards sold for thousands of euros, I got invited to pick up mine -- for a small fee of just €4,750.

A screenshot of the Otherways web site.

The Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) strongly condemns the murder of Maltese investigative reporter and blogger Daphne Caruana Galizia.

Photo credit: daphnecaruanagalizia.com

A joint investigation by Efecto Cocuyo and OCCRP ​explores the Orinoco Mining Arc — the Venezuelan government's controversial attempt to find new sources of wealth — and the devastating effects of the mining on the people who live there.

It has come to our attention that members of the current government have launched a smearing campaign against one of the members of our network.

The Azerbaijani Laundromat is a complex money-laundering operation and slush fund that handled $2.9 billion over a two-year period through four shell companies registered in the UK.

The Royal Bank of Scotland (RBS) disclosed Friday that it is under investigation by the UK’s Financial Conduct Authority for suspicions of money laundering "in relation to certain customers."

The Bucharest office of RISE Project, an Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP) partner, underwent an unannounced inspection by the anti-fraud bureau of Romania’s National Fiscal Agency (ANAF) even as important Romanian politicians threatened the outlet in both public and private.

Officers from the Romanian Anti-Fraud Authority at the offices of RISE Project, OCCRP's Romanian partner, during a surprise inspection. (Photo: RISE Project)

A special report published Wednesday urges the Ukrainian government to step up its commitment to investigating the July 2016 murder of Pavel Sheremet, a prominent investigative reporter who was killed in Kiev by an improvised explosive device planted under his car.

Authorities in Azerbaijan and Georgia are facing mounting criticism for their possible role in the apparent kidnapping of Afgan Mukhtarli, the Azerbaijani journalist who disappeared from Tbilisi on May 29 and was next seen two days later being led into a Baku courtroom.

Azerbaijani journalist Afgan Mukhtarli is brought to court in Baku, Azerbaijan on May 31 after disappearing from Tbilisi, Georgia, where he lives. (Photo: Reuters/Aziz Karimov)