GIR's Europe, Middle East, and Africa Investigations Review 2023: France chapter

White & Case is pleased to have been involved in GIR's Europe, Middle East, and Africa Investigations Review 2023. This volume contains insight and thought leadership from pre-eminent practitioners in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Inside you will find chapters on France, Italy, Russia, Switzerland and the UAE andoverviews on how UK organisations are structuring their investigations teams and the things to think about when considering a self-report.

Jean-Pierre Picca, Jean-Lou Salha and Pauline Fortin have co-authored the France chapter, named "Consolidating France's investigation ecosystem".

The past year has been eventful for compliance and investigations in France. Agencies continued to publish guidelines and clarifications regarding the French investigations arena, and legislation was enacted to strengthen whistle-blower protection. NGOs have become increasingly active in the area of the duty of vigilance, and a ruling was made on the first action brought against a French group based on this ground. Compliance and diligence regarding environmental matters have gained pace, with nine environmental CJIPs being concluded and the EU proposal on corporate sustainability due diligence on the horizon.

The France chapter discusses the following points:

• Sapin II and CJIP
• AFA guidelines on internal investigations, conflict of interest, anti-corruption accounting controls and probity for officials
• Whistle-blower protection
• Reform of the blocking statute
• Duty of Vigilance Law
• Corporate sustainability due diligence

Pauline Fortin (White & Case, Associate, Paris) co-authored this publication.

This article is reproduced with permission from GIR.

An extract from the 2023 edition of GIR's Europe, Middle East, and Africa Investigations Review. The whole publication is available at https://globalinvestigationsreview.com/review/the-european-middle-eastern-and-african-investigations-review/2023.

Any views expressed in this publication are strictly those of the authors and should not be attributed in any way to White & Case LLP.

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