Zambia has filed a lawsuit in London against its former president, demanding the return of a multimillion-dollar fortune allegedly plundered from state coffers. Lawyers for the Zambian government claim that Frederick Chiluba and his associates deposited $24 million (£13 million) of assets in London bank accounts, and have obtained an order from the High Court to freeze the assets while the case is heard.
The allegation of theft is strongly denied by Chiluba - who led the southern African country until 2001 - and the other defendants. They insist that the money was obtained legitimately.
Zambia has brought the case following an investigation by its anti-corruption taskforce into claims that Chiluba embezzled millions from public funds during his 10-year rule. He says that rival politicians are pursuing a vendetta against him, and is challenging the jurisdiction of the London court to hear the case.
If proven, the legal claim threatens to re-ignite debate about the City of London's role as a centre for international money-laundering.
It could also embarrass Tony Blair, who made rooting out corruption a central theme of his Commission for Africa report, which was published in March.
In recent years, the Nigerian government has fought a long and high-profile legal battle in London and elsewhere to identify and recover billions of dollars looted from the country by its late dictator, Sani Abacha.
Britain is a signatory to the international Anti-Bribery Convention but has yet to prosecute a single person under its provisions.
The government was strongly criticised earlier this year by the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development, which accused it of failing to devote sufficient resources to the fight against corruption.

Zambian govt should just forget that money as European govts wont be doing anything about that and fyi most of these guys emblazing money from Africa get assistance from the same pple here IN london in terms of logistics of setting up fake accounts and hiding the money in Gurnsey Island and some went on to the stock market so and thats where its more difficult to trace and of course someare invested in Properties in prime locations in London and good example is Primrose hill where Nigerian's once associated to Abacha bought almost the whole place-of course withfull knowlede on the British Government

Yeah anything that will work against the UK economy or business interests is a non-starter. This is a smoke screen, they will only investigate certain corruption, they should go after Chiluba (champion of western democracy at one stage), but the current president was once Chilluba's VP. He's settling old scores, the bigger guestion is who's gonna investigate him?