1.3 Methodology

• Suggest a series of practical steps and good practices for consideration by (a) countries exploring the possibility to introduce a direct enforcement mechanism into their domestic legal frameworks and (b) countries already in a position to directly enforce foreign confiscation orders, but that are considering options to streamline processes and maximize results obtainable via direct enforcement approaches (chapter 5).

In view of its structure and objectives, this study is addressed to a broad range of law enforcement, justice, and asset recovery practitioners as well as bodies involved in legislative and regulatory processes, such as the following:

• Officials of the offices of state attorneys general and prosecutors general, ministries of justice, and prosecutorial and judicial authorities with responsibilities in asset recovery proceedings; • Central authorities in charge of processing outgoing and incoming MLA requests, including for asset recovery; and • Policy makers in charge of preparing and drafting normative instruments in asset recovery, money laundering, corruption, MLA, and other related fields.

1.3 METHODOLOGY

This study focuses on 31 jurisdictions selected to ensure balanced geographical distribution among different United Nations Regional Groups and representation of different legal systems including civil law, common law, and mixed systems.4 Some of them are major financial centers receiving a significant amount of MLA requests related to asset recovery. Overall, the selected jurisdictions appear to constitute a representative sample providing an overview of the situation worldwide and from which guidance could be drawn. The choice of not showcasing more countries was a deliberate one owing to practical and time considerations. Future editions of this study may benefit from geographical expansion and fresh information on progress obtained in the review of countries examined under UNCAC’s Implementation Review Mechanism. Such an updated edition would allow for fine-tuning current findings and a more granular illustration of the associated challenges.

The initial phase of the study has been conducted through desk research. Information about domestic legal structures and procedures was extracted from several official sources, including national legislative databases, country-specific asset-recovery guides, and publicly available peer-review assessments. Those assessments were conducted by organizations such as (a) the Financial Action Task Force (FATF) or FATF-style bodies, (b) the Council of Europe’s Group of States Against Corruption and (the Committee of Experts on the Evaluation of Anti-Money Laundering Measures and the Financing of Terrorism, and (c) the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) in its review of the implementation of the OECD Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign Public Officials in International Business Transactions. The Mechanism for the Review of Implementation of UNCAC also featured as an important source of information. In this context, the bulk of the information was collected from evaluations conducted during the first review cycle (dealing with criminalization, law enforcement, and international cooperation). In a few cases, country information was available from this current (second) review cycle, with its