Editorial - June/July 2022

This edition of Global Insight focuses squarely on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Across our news section, columns and features we assess some of the key issues emerging from the conflict. As we go to press, the war has been raging for 100 days and with devastating consequences, including seven million people being forced to leave Ukraine and a further eight million internally displaced.

Our cover feature (The future of refugee protection) takes this human tragedy as its starting point. The international response has been remarkable with countries neighbouring Ukraine, such as Poland, welcoming extraordinary numbers of refugees. This has served to highlight the dangers of overly bureaucratic protection schemes and states publicly promising support while passing anti-refugee laws. The unprecedented public and political response to the Ukraine crisis does, however, provide clear indications of what a humanitarian response to similar future crises should look like.

Our multimedia journalist Ruth Green, meanwhile, covers other key aspects. Her feature (From atrocities to accountability) explores the extent and limits of accountability through international legal mechanisms, enforcement within Ukraine and through economic and business-related measures. Her column (Lawfare against justice) highlights the extent to which weaknesses in legal systems, particularly in the UK, have been exploited by the rich and powerful – most pertinently the oligarchs who have, for decades, been given all the means necessary to evade scrutiny while supporting and propping up Russian President Vladimir Putin.

The IBA’s finance correspondent Jonathan Watson develops this theme in some depth in his feature (Battling the kleptocrats). Russia’s invasion of Ukraine has highlighted, yet again, what has been known for decades: that the real answer to tackling corruption is well-resourced regulators, enforcement authorities and prosecutors. If governments continually fail to acknowledge this fact and act upon it, the rich and powerful will continue to run amok unchecked, and with the sorts of dire consequences we’re seeing in Ukraine.