On February 13, a South African court ordered the seizure of a superyacht and two palatial homes owned by Equatorial Guinea's Vice President Teodoro Nguema Obiang.  The suit which drove the seizure was brought by South African businessman Daniel Janse van Rensburg who was unexpectedly arrested and imprisoned while on a short business trip to Equatorial Guinea in 2013.^[1]

On March 8, 2023, an English High Court rejected final efforts of Arif Naqvi, the founder of a failed private equity firm, to block his extradition from the United Kingdom to the United States for alleged fraud and money laundering.[1]

On March 8, 2023, a trial started in which Swiss prosecutors are prosecuting four banking executives for allegedly managing accounts that assisted move millions of dollars of money belonging to Russian president Vladimir Putin.[1]

On March 2, 2023, the United States Department of Justice (DOJ) announced that Telefonaktiebolaget LM Ericsson (Ericsson), a multinational telecommunications company headquartered in Stockholm Sweden has agreed to plead guilty and pay a criminal penalty of more than $206 million after violating a 2019 Deferred Prosecution Agreement (DPA).

On February 22-24, 2023, the second plenary of the FATF under the Singapore presidency concluded.

On February 24, 2023, the White House and several agencies announced a series of additional sanctions on Russia on the one-year anniversary of Russia’s invasion of Ukraine and announced addition measures to continue provide Ukraine with support, among other things, to hold Russia accountable for its war of aggression.[1]

On February 23, 2023, a German court convicted a Palestinian man from Syria for several counts of murder and attempted murder for firing a rocket-propelled grenade (RPG) into a group of civilians in Damascus on March 23, 2014.  The blast killed four people and seriously wounded two others waiting to receive food assistance from the U.N. Relief and Works Agency for Palestine Refugees in the Near East.  The defendant was first charged with war crimes, seven counts of murder, and three counts of attempted murder in August 2022.[1]

With respect to international corruption, called “bribery of foreign public officials,” the following questions spontaneously arise: Who is in charge of fighting corruption in a country? Can a country prosecute another country's corruption cases, with what legitimacy and on what legal basis? Who determines jurisdiction?

On February 15, 2023, the Swiss Federal Council decided to launch administrative proceedings to confiscate assets linked to former Ukrainian President Yanukovych, and his associates, that have been frozen since the 2014 Ukrainian revolution that saw him leave his office.  The Federal Council instructed the Federal Department of Finances (FDF) to initiate forfeiture proceedings in the Federal Administrative Court (FAC) for assets totaling over $130 million in Swiss francs.  Pursuant to prior agreements, any property that is permanently confiscated will be returned to Ukraine.[1]

On February 14, 2023, the European Council issued a revised list of non-cooperative jurisdictions for tax purposes.  It added to its list the British Virgin Islands, Costa Rica, Marshall Islands and Russia.[1]