Each evaluation round is focused on a separate topic: the subject of the sixth round will be prevention of corruption and promotion of integrity at the sub-national level.
Specifically, GRECO will examine:
- The system of government at the national and sub-national levels, distribution of competencies, and the role of national authorities in promoting integrity and preventing corruption at the sub-national level;
- The applicability of national anti-corruption policies and/or strategies at the sub-national level;
- Implementation of national anti-corruption and integrity legislation by sub-national authorities;
- The results achieved with respect to corruption offences at the sub-national level;
- The institutional anti-corruption framework at the sub-national level, and implementation of anti-corruption and integrity mechanisms by sub-national authorities with regard to such issues as:
- Anti-corruption and integrity policies and/or strategies;
- Corruption risk assessment(s);
- Standards of conduct and ethics;
- Conflicts of interest;
- Declarations of assets and interests;
- Prohibition or restriction of certain activities;
- Transparency, accountability, access to information, public participation;
- Control mechanisms and oversight;
- Disclosure of corruption violations, whistleblower protection;
- Enforcement and sanctions against corruption.
Like the previous rounds, the sixth one will consist of two stages, namely 1) evaluation, and 2) monitoring of implementation of recommendations issued in the end of evaluation.
At the first stage, the country under evaluation, among other things, completes autonomously a model questionnaire that makes it possible to get essential information about the implementation of certain anti-corruption measures (the questionnaire for the sixth round is available here) and hosts a GRECO expert delegation that meets representatives of competent authorities with the aim to draft a report containing, in particular, the recommendations on how to eliminate the detected shortcomings. The recommendations take into account the reference texts such as the standards of the Council of Europe and other international organisations (for example, the United Nations and the OECD) and other relevant materials.
The second stage consists of monitoring of implementation of recommendations: 18 months later the evaluated country submits a report to GRECO. In this document, the country indicates the actions it has undertaken to implement each recommendation and, if recommendations are not fully implemented, GRECO carries out an additional verification within the following 18 months.
The first countries to be subject to the evaluation under the sixth round will be Estonia and Slovakia; their country visits will see the participation of 96 trained experts from 45 GRECO member states.