At today's session, the Council of the Agency for Prevention of Corruption discussed the Report on the implementation of the Agency's Work Plan for the second quarter of 2022.

It was established that in the first half of 2022, the Agency fully implemented all activities foreseen in the Work Plan for 2022 and in all areas continued the positive trend in work, which in all segments was the most efficient since its establishment.

In the first half of 2022, acting on all the requests received, the Agency issued 119 Opinions in the area of conflicts of interest and restrictions on the performance of public functions, for a little over 20% more than in the same period of the previous year. On the basis of the Opinions and Decisions of the Agency, 8 resignations of public officials were submitted.

In the first half of 2022, 203 gifts, 138 sponsorships and 2,173 donations received during 2021 were reported to the Agency. The trend of growth in reported donations continued (by 42% more compared to the previous year), as well as the growth in reported gifts (four and a half times more than the previous year and the most since the beginning of the work of APC), and the number of registered sponsorships is also higher (five times more than the previous year). Based on the verification of the reports received, in the second quarter of 2022, a total of 27 irregularities were determined, on the basis of which misdemeanor proceedings were initiated.

In the first half of 2022, a total of 8,727 reports on income and assets were submitted to the Agency, of which the majority were regular annual reports, which were submitted by 95% of public officials and civil servants within the legal deadline by March 31.

In the second quarter, the verification of the accuracy and completeness of the data in the reports began, and in this context, 749 reports on income and assets were verified, which means that 56.3% of the 1,330 planned reports have already been verified. In addition, acting ex-officio, the Agency started verification of the accuracy and completeness of additional 38 reports on income and assets.

In the domain of monitoring the lifestyle of public officials, the Agency submitted one case to the Special State Prosecutor's Office in the second quarter.

In the area of control of the financing of political entities and election campaigns, during the first half of 2022, control was carried out of 20,491 reports, originating from the LFPEEC, on regular work and during election campaigns for already held local elections, as well as for the elections scheduled for October 23. Also, 539 inspections of compliance with prohibitions and restrictions during election campaigns were carried out. In addition, the control of 14 prescribed prohibitions was carried out, i.e. the verification and control of 2,199 persons who give contributions to political entities.

In the first half of 2022, there were 89 whistleblower reports, 19% more compared to the same reporting period of the previous year and the most since the beginning of APC's work at the level of the first six months of the year, which continues the trend of increasing the number of reports.

In the first half of 2022, the Agency completed 19 procedures based on whistleblower reports, in 4 of which the existence of threats to the public interest was determined, and the Agency sent 6 recommendations to subjects to the Law for improving transparency and elimination.

The Agency handed over 3 whistleblower reports (proceedings in progress) to the competent prosecutor's offices for further processing, and 1 to another competent authority.

Also, the APC initiated 7 ex officio proceedings due to the suspicion of endangering the public interest, which points to the existence of corruption, and continued work on 4 ex officio proceedings from 2021. 4 procedures were completed and in all of them it was determined that the public interest was endangered. On that occasion, the agency gave the subject to the Law 6 recommendations for improving transparency and eliminating corruption risks.

In the first half of 2022, 3 requests for protection of whistleblowers were submitted to the Agency, and work continued on one procedure based on the request for protection from 2021. One procedure was suspended due to the withdrawal of the request, in one the merits of the request were not determined, while the other two procedures are ongoing.

In the field of adoption and implementation of integrity plans, out of a total of 732 authorities, 727 appointed integrity managers - 99.3%, and 723 adopted an integrity plan - 98.8%. By June 30, 2022, 698 reports on the implementation of the integrity plan in 2021 were submitted to the Agency.

Two calls for applications for candidates to take the exam for conducting lobbying activities were published and two exams were organized. In the second quarter of 2022, four certificates of passing the exam for conducting lobbying activities were issued, while one natural person, after submitting a request, was registered in the lobbyist registry.