Finance and Economic

A top U.S. commander Wednesday said piracy in Somalia can only be defeated if the international community helps restore governance in the poor, lawless African country.

Adm. Robert Willard, chief of the U.S. Pacific Command, said navy patrols alone cannot stop the hijacking of ships if pirates’ bases onshore are allowed to operate without interference. The international community is spending millions of dollars a day maintaining a flotilla of warships to protect key shipping lanes off East Africa.

“The organizers, the funders are the central problem … but the international community has been unable to determine how to tackle the problem onshore,” Willard told a regional forum in Malaysia.

“Clearly, one thing is to help Somalia recover from being the ungoverned state that it is,” he said.

“Unless the international community goes to the root, and not the far end of the problem, it won’t be solved.”

Somalia has not had an effective government since 1991, when warlords overthrew a longtime dictator and then turned on each other, plunging the country into chaos and anarchy. A transitional government, established in 2004 and backed by about 9,000 African Union troops, has been fighting Islamist insurgents paydayloans.

Last year, pirates seized 53 vessels and captured a record 1,181 hostages, almost all of them off the Somali coast. Some 30 ships and more than 600 hostages are still in pirates’ hands.

Pirates are becoming increasingly violent in retaliation to navy interference in their multimillion dollar trade. Earlier this year pirates killed four American hostages while U.S. Navy warships were shadowing the hijacked yacht, the first time pirates had done that.

The U.N. Security Council last month demanded that Somalia’s feuding president and parliament reach agreement quickly on holding elections by August when the mandate for the country’s transitional government ends.

Somali lawmakers _ who in February unilaterally extended their own mandate by three years _ have been vowing for months to hold a presidential vote despite the president’s objections. The president wants to extend his term for a year without a vote.

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Community Health Systems Inc. has ended its effort to buy competitor Tenet Healthcare Corp. after Tenet rejected its latest $4 billion-plus offer.

Franklin, Tenn.-based Community Health said Monday it withdrew its offer to buy Tenet for $7.25 per share. It has also rescinded its effort to put nominees on Tenet’s board of directors.

Tenet shares fell 6 cents to $6.46 in pre-market trading Tuesday.

Community Health has been trying to acquire Tenet since late 2010. It originally made a bid of $6 per share for the Dallas company, and took the bid public after Tenet turned it down. Community Health raised its offer on May 2. The latest bid valued Tenet at about $4 payday loans no teletrack.06 billion.

Tenet also opposed the takeover offer efforts by adopting a “poison pill” stock dilution measure, delaying its annual meeting by six months, and filing a lawsuit that accused Community Health of defrauding Medicare.

Tenet said Monday that he latest offer was still too low. Community Health had said that bid would be its last offer.

Community Health runs about 130 hospitals in fast-growing and non-urban markets, while Tenet’s 49 hospitals are in urban and suburban markets.

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Suspicion rose Monday that Pakistan’s intelligence service leaked the name of the CIA chief in Islamabad to local media in anger over the raid that killed Osama bin Laden _ the second outing of an American covert operative here in six months.

The U.S. said it has no plans to pull the spy chief, but the incident is likely to exacerbate an already troubled relationship between the two countries a week after Navy SEALs in helicopters swooped down on bin Laden’s compound without first telling the Pakistanis. The CIA and Pakistan’s spy agency have long viewed each other with suspicion, which the death of the terror leader has laid bare.

The Pakistani military and intelligence services have suffered withering criticism at home for failing to stop the U.S. operation. Many Pakistanis view the raid as a violation of their sovereignty _ even if they were pleased that bin Laden was killed.

U.S. officials have said they didn’t tell Pakistanis in advance because they were worried someone might tip off bin Laden. American forces also used helicopters with radar-evading technology so the Pakistanis couldn’t track them.

Pakistani Prime Minister Yousuf Raza Gilani defended the military and intelligence services Monday, telling parliament it was “disingenuous for anyone to blame Pakistan … for being in cahoots with al-Qaida.”

He acknowledged his nation’s failure to track bin Laden but said the failure wasn’t Pakistan’s alone.

“Yes, there has been an intelligence failure,” Gilani said. “It is not only ours but of all the intelligence agencies of the world.”

U.S. officials have said they see no evidence that anyone in the upper echelons of Pakistan’s military and intelligence establishment was complicit in hiding bin Laden in Abbottabad, an army town only 35 miles from the capital. But suspicions remain, and members of Congress have threatened to cut off U.S. aid if evidence is found.

President Barack Obama said the U.S. believes bin Laden must have had a support network inside Pakistan.

“But we don’t know who or what that support network was,” Obama said in an interview broadcast Sunday on CBS’ “60 Minutes.” “We don’t know whether there might have been some people inside of government, people outside of government, and that’s something that we have to investigate, and more importantly, the Pakistani government has to investigate.”

Gilani proclaimed the death of bin Laden as “indeed justice done” since al-Qaida has launched many attacks inside Pakistan. But he warned the U.S. not to try a similar covert raid in the future.

“Unilateralism runs the inherent risk of serious consequences,” Gilani said. “Pakistan reserves the right to retaliate with full force. … No one should underestimate the resolve and capability of our nation and armed forces to defend our sacred homeland.”

At the same time, however, he stressed the importance of Pakistan-U.S. ties and insisted the relationship was still strong.

“Our communications at the official and diplomatic levels with the U.S., during this phase, have been good, productive and straightforward,” said Gilani.

Gilani’s speech and the suspected leak of the CIA station chief’s name illustrate the balancing act that Pakistani officials seem to be trying to achieve in responding to the bin Laden raid.

Civilian and military leaders must placate a domestic population that is upset at the U.S. for violating the country’s sovereignty and outraged at the country’s army and intelligence agency for allowing it to happen. But they must also worry about preserving their relationship with the U.S., which provides billions of dollars in military and civilian aid for cooperation on the war in Afghanistan.

“Gilani’s statement and the leak of the name of the name of the supposed CIA station chief appear to be in keeping with Islamabad’s need to maintain relations with the United States and at the same time try and counter growing U.S. pressure in the wake of the Osama bin Laden killing,” said Kamran Bokhari, an analyst with STRATFOR, a private security think tank in Austin, Texas.

Even before the discovery of bin Laden, many U.S. officials accused Pakistan of playing a double game by taking American aid, promising its support and then failing to target key Islamist militants wanted by the U.S., including Taliban chief Mullah Mohammed Omar.

But the U.S. is in a difficult position because it is reliant on Pakistan’s help to go after Taliban militants on its territory and ships a large percentage of its non-lethal goods to its forces in Afghanistan through the country. Pakistan also allows the CIA drones to carry out missile strikes on militant targets in the border regions. Pushing Pakistan too hard could jeopardize the relationship with the critical, if fickle, ally.

On Friday, the private TV channel ARY broadcast what it said was the current CIA station chief’s name. The Nation, a right-wing newspaper, picked up the story Saturday.

Although the name was misspelled, the publication of any alleged identity of the U.S. spy agency’s top official in this country could be push-back from Pakistan’s powerful military and spy agency in retaliation for the American raid.

The Associated Press is not publishing the station chief’s name because he is undercover and his identity is classified. A spokesman for Pakistani intelligence declined to comment.

ARY’s news director, Mazhar Abbas, said the television station’s reporter gleaned the name from a source. He defended the broadcast, saying it was “based on fact” and rejected suggestions the name was leaked to the television channel by an official with a motive.

A U.S. official, speaking on condition of anonymity because of the sensitivity of discussing CIA personnel issues, told the AP that there are no plans to remove the station chief from Pakistan.

Asad Munir, a former intelligence chief with responsibility for Pakistan’s militant-populated tribal areas, said very few people know the name of the CIA station chief in Islamabad. But he said that releasing it would not necessarily jeopardize the American’s safety.

“Normally people in intelligence have cover names,” Munir said. “Only if there is a photograph to identify him could it put his life in danger.”

In December, the CIA pulled its then-station chief out of Pakistan after a name alleged to be his surfaced in public and his safety was deemed at risk. That name hit the local presses after it was mentioned by a lawyer who planned a lawsuit on behalf of victims of U.S. drone strikes in Pakistan’s tribal belt.

Suspicions have lingered that that outing was orchestrated by Pakistan’s spy agency to avenge an American lawsuit that named its chief over the 2008 terror attacks on the Indian city of Mumbai. The Pakistani agency denied leaking the CIA operative’s name.

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The Bank of England won’t raise its interest rate until 2013 as the economic recovery’s momentum stays “pretty weak,” Deloitte & Touche LLP said.

“The underlying momentum of the economic recovery looks pretty weak,” Deloitte’s economic adviser Roger Bootle, a former adviser to the U.K. Treasury, said in a report today. “My central forecast is still that rates remain on hold throughout this year and next.”

Bank of England policy makers have split four ways on whether to raise interest rates or add stimulus to aid the recovery at a time when inflation remains at twice the Monetary Policy Committee’s 2 percent target. Britain’s economy grew 0.5 percent in the first quarter, just enough to offset the contraction in the final three months of 2010.

“It is not out of the question that the MPC will eventually need to give more support to the economy,” Bootle said. “But additional asset purchases, if they do come, are perhaps unlikely until 2012.”

Bootle expects gross domestic product to increase 1.5 percent this year and next, according to the report. Inflation will average 4.4 percent this year before falling to 1.8 percent in 2012.

The Bank of England kept its benchmark rate unchanged at 0.5 percent last month. The rate will rise by 25 basis points by November, according to forward contracts on the sterling overnight interbank average, or Sonia, compiled by Tullett Prebon Ltd.

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Confidence among U.S. consumers increased more than forecast in April, signaling the improving labor market is helping Americans weather rising fuel costs.

The Conference Board’s confidence index rose to 65.4 from a revised 63.8 reading in March, figures from the New York-based private research group showed today. The median forecast of economists surveyed by Bloomberg News called projected an advance to 64.5.

Six straight months of job growth along with joblessness at a two-year low in March are helping sustain consumer purchases, which account for about 70 percent of the economy. At the same time, bigger gains in sentiment may be difficult as households spend more for food and gasoline, which is at the highest level in almost three years.

“Confidence is picking up on the back of an improving labor market and rising stock prices, which are offsetting higher gasoline costs,” said Sal Guatieri, a senior economist at BMO Capital Markets Inc. in Toronto. “Consumers will have both the confidence and the income to keep spending.”

Stocks held earlier gains after the report on optimism over improving corporate earnings. The Standard & Poor’s 500 Index rose 0.4 percent to 1,340.8 at 10:17 a.m. in New York. Treasury securities rose, sending the yield on the benchmark 10-year note down to 3.34 percent from 3.37 percent late yesterday.

Home Prices

Another report today showed residential real estate prices dropped in February by the most in more than a year, a sign the housing market is struggling to stabilize.

The S&P/Case-Shiller index of property values in 20 cities fell 3.3 percent from February 2010, the biggest year-over-year decrease since November 2009.

Estimates for consumer confidence ranged from 57 to 68 in the Bloomberg survey of 69 economists. The measure averaged 97 during the expansion that ended in December 2007.

The group’s measure of present conditions increased to 39.6, the highest since November 2008, from 37.5 a month earlier. The gauge of expectations for the next six months rose to 82.6 from 81.3.

The share of consumers who said jobs are currently plentiful rose to 5.2 percent from 4.6 percent. Those who said jobs are hard to get decreased to 41.8 percent, the fewest since January 2009, from 44.4 percent.

Jobs Outlook

The outlook was less rosy. The percent of respondents expecting more jobs to become available in the next six months decreased to 17 cash advance today.5 from 19.6 the previous month. The share expecting incomes to rise over the next six months improved to 16.7 percent from 15.2 percent.

The report contained one positive bit of news for the housing market, which has lagged behind other parts of the economy since the recession ended in June 2009. The share of Americans planning to buy a house over the next six months increased to 5.5 percent, matching the record high reached in January 1978. Data go back to 1964.

Intentions to purchase automobiles and appliances also improved.

Fuel costs may be preventing bigger gains in confidence. The average price of regular fuel climbed to $3.87 a gallon yesterday, the highest level since August 2008, according to AAA, the nation’s biggest motoring organization.

Confidence ‘Fragile’

“The economic climate is still less than ideal, from a slow and uneven recovery to significantly rising commodity costs and fragile consumer confidence,” Jim Skinner, chief executive officer of McDonald’s Corp. (MCD), said on a conference call with analysts on April 21.

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The OECD is recommending that Japan as much as quadruple its sales tax rate to deal with a crushing deficit that’s bound to grow as it spends on reconstruction from last month’s earthquake and tsunami.

Economists in the group of the world’s wealthiest countries said in a report released Thursday that the country should boost the sales tax, now 5 percent, to as high as 20 percent while cutting corporate taxes.

OECD Secretary-General Angel Gurria says Japan has to perform a balancing act as it finances reconstruction following the March 11 disasters while sustaining its economic recovery and cutting debt.

The Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development also recommends education system changes, freer trade with other countries and other reforms.

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Regulators have shut down a total of six banks in Alabama, Georgia, Minnesota and Mississippi, boosting the number of U.S. bank failures this year to 34. There were 157 bank closures in 2010 amid the shattered economy and piles of bad loans.

The Federal Deposit Insurance Corp. seized Superior Bank, based in Birmingham, Ala., with $3 billion in assets; Birmingham-based Nexity Bank, with $793.7 million in assets; Bartow County Bank of Cartersville, Ga low fee payday advance., with $330.2 million in assets; and New Horizons Bank in East Ellijay, Ga., with $110.7 million in assets.

It also shut down Rosemount National Bank in Rosemount, Minn., with $37.6 million in assets, and Heritage Banking Group, based in Carthage, Miss., with $224 million in assets.

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The first-place party in Ireland’s national election expects to begin talks on forming a new government.

The initiative on Monday rests with Fine Gael, which has so far won 70 seats in the 166-seat lower house of Parliament. Results are not yet complete.

Fine Gael’s possible coalition partner, the Labour Party, has won 36 seats while the long-dominant Fianna Fail party suffered its worst election ever, with only 18 seats so far.

If Fine Gael gets its winning total up into the higher seventies, it could also opt to form a one-party government with backing from some of the 13 independents who have won seats.

THIS IS A BREAKING NEWS UPDATE. Check back soon for further information. AP’s earlier story is below.

DUBLIN (AP) _ Opposition leader Enda Kenny has already shattered Ireland’s 80-year-old political monopoly. Now he faces an even more challenging assignment _ rebuilding Ireland’s economy, nearly brought to its knees by reckless property speculation and bank lending.

Defying doubters of his ability, Kenny rebuilt his Fine Gael party into a force that handed the ruling Fianna Fail party its worst defeat since 1932 in Friday’s national vote. He faces a decision within days on building a stable government that will respond to Irish voters angry and anxious over the nation’s economic freefall and subsequent bailout by the European Union and the International Monetary Fund.

In victory, Kenny made big promises of a new style of government.

His administration will be “one of responsibility, not privilege; a government of public duty, not personal entitlement; a government looking with confidence and courage to the future, not with guilt and regret at the past,” Ireland’s next prime minister told delirious supporters late Saturday.

Only eight months ago, his Fine Gael colleagues thought so little of his leadership that they tried to oust him.

But the steely nerve and sharp tactics that Kenny displayed in rebuffing that challenge will be sorely tested as he works to assemble a strong government _ either with another party, or with the support of independents.

The latter option offers Kenny more opportunities to reward Fine Gael legislators with ministerial jobs. The temptation grows as Fine Gael wins more places in the 166-seat Dail, the lower house of Parliament; with 78 or more seats, going it alone is a viable option.

“We stand on the brink of fundamental change in how we regard ourselves, in how we regard our economy, and in how we regard our society,” Kenny said saving account pay day loan.

The vote count continued for a second day Sunday, with Fine Gael winning 68 seats and the Labour Party taking 35. Fianna Fail, which had won the most seats in every election since 1932 but was in power when Ireland’s “Celtic Tiger” economy imploded, won just 17. Sinn Fein _ which supported the Irish Republican Army in Northern Ireland _ had 13, and independents and smaller parties had 17 seats.

Irish voters punished Fianna Fail for 13 percent unemployment, tax hikes, wage cuts and a humiliating bailout that will require years of austerity budgets.

Fine Gael has experience in governing in a coalition with Labour, and Labour leader Eamon Gilmore appeared eager to deal. The combination would offer Kenny an overwhelming majority, as well as a partner to share the heat when tough choices stir popular outrage.

Still, the new government, like the last, will be constrained by the terms negotiated for the euro67.5 billion ($92 billion) credit line from the European Central Bank and the IMF. The loan is contingent on Ireland cutting euro15 billion ($20.6 billion) from its deficit spending over the coming four years and imposing the harshest cuts this year.

Kenny has pledged to try to negotiate easier terms for repaying the bailout loan. He has also promised to create 100,000 new jobs in five years and to make senior bond holders in Ireland’s nationalized banks shoulder some of the losses.

Fine Gael said it would seek to balance public finances mainly through cuts, not tax hikes; it would also reform the health service and abolish 150 public bodies.

Kenny’s path to the top has been long and, in earlier years, slow moving. Kenny, then a teacher, was elected to the Dail in 1975 to take the place of his father, who had died suddenly.

In the 2002 election, in which Fine Gael lost 23 of the 54 seats it held in the Dail, Kenny reportedly had his concession speech ready but scraped by to win a seat. Elected leader that same year, he led a revived party to win 51 seats in 2007.

Chris Curtin, head of the School of Political Science and Sociology at the National University of Ireland, Galway, said Kenny’s popularity was due to his reputation for straight dealing.

“He is seen as an incredibly honorable person, without any thread of anything untoward attached to him,” Curtin said.

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How can contractors best manage their tax burdens ahead of the March 15 corporate tax filing deadline?

The recent economic climate has been especially challenging for contractors trying to manage cash flow. As the corporate tax deadline approaches, builders can deploy some strategies to manage their tax burdens and leverage new tax incentives. It requires thoughtful and nimble analysis but tax planning should take into account double bonus depreciation, which equals full expensing!

Lawmakers have extended and doubled bonus depreciation, allowing for full expensing for many assets placed into service through 2011.

Contractors should also review deferred-compensation plans. Most contractors are struggling to remain profitable in this difficult environment. If a company cannot afford large bonuses to retain key employees, it should revisit alternative compensation arrangements.

Certain S corporations should consider taking gains in 2011. Converters to S corporation status in 2004 or 2005 should think of selling “gain” property in 2011 easy payday loans. Special provisions enacted over the past two years provide a reduced seven-year period for sales that occurred in 2009 or 2010 and a five-year period for sales of property during 2011.

Take full advantage of capital asset expensing deductions. Rules originally intended for small businesses were significantly expanded to allow contractors to expense up to $500,000 of 2010 fixed asset costs, provided less than $2 million of assets were put in service throughout the year. Unlike bonus depreciation, this applies to new or used assets.

Maximize Section 199 deductions. That section’s domestic production activities deduction is a unique tax incentive available to most contractors. This incentive allows taxpayers to deduct 9 percent of qualifying production activities, including construction or substantial renovation of domestic real property.

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Switzerland has frozen whatever assets Hosni Mubarak and his associates may have there, and anti-corruption campaigners are demanding the same of other countries. But experts say hunting for the deposed Egyptian leader’s purported hidden wealth _ let alone recovering it _ will be an enormous task.

Mubarak’s actual worth remains a mystery. A recent claim that he and his sons Gamal and Alaa may have amassed a fortune of up to $70 billion _ greater than that of Microsoft’s Bill Gates _ helped drive the protests that eventually brought him down.

“Oh, Mubarak, tell us where you got 70 billion dollars!” protesters chanted in demonstrations before Egypt’s ruler of 30 years was driven from office Friday, and left Cairo for a gated compound in the Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh.

Corruption was endemic in Mubarak’s Egypt where 40 percent of the country’s 80 million people live on $2 or less a day, and critics accused officials of usurping the nation’s wealth. Egyptians have long complained of an unspoken policy of sweetheart deals that allowed top officials and businessmen to enrich themselves.

In recent days, watchdog groups and private lawyers have demanded that the country’s chief prosecutor launch criminal investigations against the Mubaraks and some of their wealthy associates. Scores of former government officials have already been banned from travel and several, among them four former Cabinet ministers, have had their assets frozen.

How far these investigations will go ultimately depends on the political will of Egypt’s leadership, said Eric Lewis, a partner with Washington-based law firm Baach, Robinson & Lewis, which specializes in international asset tracing and has done work in Kenya and Pakistan.

“What you often find is that while there’s a kind of political impetus that seems to want to do it, the reality is that the real urge for transparency is more symbolic than real,” Lewis said.

Far-reaching corruption probes could test the resolve of senior military officials who are running the country in the transition period. Some warn that a purge of Egypt’s tycoons could make economic recovery from the political crisis more difficult.

Anti-corruption campaigners are calling for a speedy investigation and are urging countries other than Switzerland to freeze assets pre-emptively. “It’s going to be a very difficult task, but in the interest of public money, things need to move now,” said Omnia Hussien, Egypt expert at the advocacy group Transparency International.

The Mubaraks have never publicly discussed their assets. Hosni Mubarak’s official monthly salary as president, counting benefits, came to 4,750 Egyptian pounds ($808), in 2007 and 2008, according to a Cairo think tank.

Rumors of hidden riches, such as expensive real estate in Britain, the United States and elsewhere, were fueled by the cozy ties between the Mubaraks and Egypt’s business elite. The sale of state companies and public land for cheap, starting in the 1990s, were key sources of enrichment for the two sides, said Ahmed Elsayed Elnaggar, editor of Egypt’s Economic Report.

“Privatization … is the biggest corruption process in Egypt all over its history, from the period of the pharaohs, until now,” he said.

In the past six months, two leading real estate companies have seen projects challenged in court over such alleged links.

In a case that captivated the country, Talaat Moustafa Group saw its $3 billion planned Madinaty community challenged on claims it was illegally awarded to the firm without the required bidding process, at a loss of $26 billion to the public coffers.

The country’s highest administrative court upheld a ruling that the government had to re-offer the land, a decision that threatened to cast doubt on more than 100 other such projects in Egypt. Instead, a government-appointed committee re-awarded the contract, essentially on the same terms, arguing that it was in the national interest to retain the existing ownership and that TMG’s work on the land had altered its value low interest personal loan.

TMG had been headed by Hisham Talaat Moustafa, a former parliament member who was subsequently stripped of his immunity and sentenced to 15 years for ordering the murder of his Lebanese diva girlfriend.

Palm Hills Development, specializing in upscale residential compounds, faced a similar case _ and its ownership structure is a case study of the ties between public officials and the business world. Relatives of the recently fired housing minister and of a transportation minister who resigned in 2009 either hold stakes in or are on the board of one of the major shareholders of Palm Hills.

Mubarak’s younger son, 47-year-old Gamal, set himself up as the director of a London-based investment firm called Medinvest Associates Ltd. in 1996, but resigned in 2001. Said Kaba, a current director of Medinvest, said the company is no longer linked to Mubarak’s relatives, telling the Sunday Times in London that he knew little about the family’s possible U.K. investments.

Medinvest, based in a stone-front building in London’s swank Knightsbridge neighborhood, is listed as having one employee and 50,000 pounds sterling (nearly $80,000) of issued capital _ the minimum needed to get a trading certificate, operate a business and borrow. The company’s profit and turnover weren’t disclosed. Its net assets were valued at just over 225,000 pounds (nearly $360,000).

Gamal Mubarak is listed as the owner of 28 Wilton Place, a six-story Georgian townhouse a few blocks from Medinvest’s office.

The Cairo-based Mideast investment bank EFG-Hermes said Gamal Mubarak holds an 18 percent share in a subsidiary, EFG Hermes Private Equity. The bank said Gamal Mubarak’s relationship with the company began in 1997, before he entered politics, and was made public at the time. The banks said it “does not manage funds for the Mubarak family, nor has it received _ directly or indirectly _ any benefits or special consideration from the Egyptian government.”

Gamal Mubarak entered politics in 2000 and quickly rose to the top of his father’s ruling National Democratic Party. He was fired from the party’s political bureau last week in what appeared to be a failed attempt by the regime to buy time and defuse public anger.

While corruption complaints up to now have focused on former top officials, Egyptian lawyer Ibrahim Youssri said he is seeking a criminal investigation of the Mubarak family. Youssri said the general prosecutor agreed to meet with him Monday to review the evidence.

“This is a really positive sign,” Youssri said.

Officials in the prosecutor’s office were not immediately available for comment.

Egypt can only start the long process of recovering assets once it launches criminal investigations, said Daniel Thelesklaf, who heads the Basel-based International Center for Asset Recovery. After that first step, Switzerland can release bank information, to be followed by the return of assets following convictions, he said.

Last month, after the ouster of another Mideast autocrat, Tunisia’s Zine Al Abidine Ben Ali, Switzerland froze the bank assets, estimated at $620 million, of former Tunisian government officials.

Thelesklaf said recovering assets has become easier in recent years, with the adoption of international anti-corruption conventions. Egypt is a signatory, and so are the United Arab Emirates, touted as a possible retirement refuge for Mubarak.

The responsibility lies with the Egyptian authorities to get an investigation started, said Thelesklaf, noting that other countries with limited resources, such as Haiti and Nigeria, have managed to repatriate public funds. “If Nigeria can do it, Egypt can do it,” he said.

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