Influence peddling

It is punishable as a crime in Argentina, Belgium, Bulgaria, Brazil, France, Hungary, Italy, Mexico, Portugal, Romania,[2] Spain, and the United Kingdom.

In December 2008, Rod Blagojevich, the then Governor of Illinois, was accused of influence peddling in attempting to sell the U.S. Senate seat vacated by the then President-elect Barack Obama.

[4] In April 2009, former Newfoundland and Labrador politician Ed Byrne was convicted of influence peddling for his actions in the Constituency Allowance Scandal.

It was alleged that, between 2011 and 2014, he lobbied for Odebrecht company to gain public procurements in foreign countries while also getting BNDES to finance those projects.

On 9 December 2016, the National Assembly impeached Park Geun-hye, the president of South Korea from 2013 to 2017, on charges related to influence peddling by her top aide Choi Soon-sil, and Hwang Kyo-ahn, the then Prime Minister of South Korea, assumed her powers and duties as Acting President as a result.

[citation needed] The Constitutional Court of Korea upheld the impeachment by a unanimous 8–0 ruling on 10 March 2017, thereby removing Park from office.