The entire global community should work together in building a cooperative mechanism to fight against corruption, which is increasingly internationalizing, said a Chinese official in Beijing Monday.

Wang Jianming, director of the National Anti-corruption and Anti-bribery Bureau under the Supreme People's Procuratorate, said that the existing legal mechanism of one country finds it more and more difficult to deal with corrupt crimes as transnational corrupt crimes are getting rampant.

Many criminals flee to another country that has not signed an extradition treaty with their resident country before being found guilty, evading legal penalties.

These legal problems have pushed countries to rethink their countermeasures and strengthen cooperation, said Wang while attending the 22nd Congress on the Law of the World. Statistics show that China's procuratorial organs have captured more than 70 criminals who fled abroad in coordination with domestic and foreign organs since 1998.

The Chinese government has signed nearly 100 multilateral international conventions concerning international crimes, including the United Nations Anti-corruption Convention, and extradition treaties with 21 countries.

Wang urged governments to put high on their agenda the prohibition and of cross-border corruption, work out action plans, set up a corrupt crimes database, intelligence exchange mechanism, and an international cooperation mechanism.

However, he said, no global cooperative mechanism to crack down on corruption has been established. The UN Anti-corruption Convention offers a legal framework, but its potential remains to be tapped by signatory countries in bilateral treaties and domestic laws.

(Xinhua News Agency September 6, 2005)