Towards the end of October, the OECD released a statement criticizing the Czech Republic for failing to organize a series of meetings for its delegation. The assemblies were to conduct a survey on the country's progress in fighting transnational bribery._x000D_ Reached at his office in Paris, Patrick Moulette, who heads the OECD's anti-corruption division, said the body was "very concerned" by the cancellation of the trip. It wasn't merely the fact that no other country has ever dared to refuse such an investigation. Just as troubling said Moulette, was the fact that he got the message from the Czech Ministry of Justice on Friday, Oct. 7, just three days before the meetings were supposed to begin._x000D_ "It's a matter of great concern that our examiners couldn't go there because the Czech authorities said they were not prepared," he said. "To me, the message is not very convincing, because the excuses raised were related to organizational, technical and logistical problems. Frankly there are always technical problems, because it's not an easy process. But if there's the political willingness to deal with such issues, then you'll do it."_x000D_ It's not as if this was a surprise trip called at the last moment - the schedule was finalized in February. Along with 36 other nations, the Czech Republic is signature to the Anti-Bribery Convention, created to stamp out the corruption of local officials by foreign companies. Each year, an OECD delegation is sent for a week to roughly six countries to conduct interviews with government officials, civil servants, private sector representatives and even the media. A report is prepared, discussed by a governing board and the results are published. Hungary did it last year, Slovakia this year, and 19 other nations have also been through the process. The Czech move is totally without precedent._x000D_ The Ministry of Justice's spokeswoman promised to look into the matter and provide an official version, but none was forthcoming, even after a copy of the press release was forwarded to her email. It's hard to know what they could answer, though since every other member of the OECD has found six months plenty of time for organizational matters. The Czech Republic, a proud new member of the European Union, is now reduced to the role of a student who's forgotten, or refuses to do, his homework._x000D_ Or perhaps a student who's having problems at home. The delegation was supposed to investigate anti-bribery progress - the trip comes as the Unipetrol scandal is coming to a head. A Polish prosecutor is threatening to put former Czech ministers on the witness stand on the suspicion that, along with Polish representatives, they were involved in a web of corruption enveloping Unipetrol's privatization. If the Czechs simply wanted to avoid a bad report card from the OECD, they couldn't have chosen a worse tactic.