Image: Mark Pyman (left) with SIPRI Senior Researcher Carina Solmirano (courtesy of @Operation1325 via Twitter)
On 5 November SIPRI was pleased to host a lecture by Mark Pyman, Director of Transparency International's Defence and Security Programme, entitled 'Transparency in the military sector: the role of parliaments'.
Pyman presented a new Transparency International report covering 82 countries, which surveys the role of parliaments in monitoring and overseeing defense policy and military budgets, expenditure and procurement.
While Pyman began by stating "I don't really need to tell you why defence corruption is a bad thing," he went on to elaborate that in essence it's dangerous, divisive and wasteful.
He explained that only two countries—Australia and Germany—scored an 'A' in the report's Government Defence Anti-Corruption Index, while nine countries scored an 'F': Algeria, Angola, Cameroon, DRC, Egypt, Eritrea, Libya, Syria and Yemen.
The Watchdogs report's recommendations focus on the need for diverse and bipartisan oversight of government military spending.