The Panama Papers - massive data leak revealing widespread corruption

[88m3]

Panama signs bank account info sharing deal with US

• 
  

© AFP/File | A police car outside the Mossack-Fonseca law firm offices in Panama City during a raid on April 12, 2016
PANAMA CITY (AFP) -

Panama and the United States on Wednesday signed an agreement on sharing of back account information in a step Panama's finance minister hailed as proof of his country's cooperation in fighting tax evasion.

The bilateral agreement comes weeks after the Panama Papers, a series of reports around the world revealing how one Panamanian law firm set up offshore entities to help the world's wealthy stash their assets.

Following the revelations, Panama has come under intense international pressure to open its financial sector to greater transparency or risk being put back on an global "tax haven" blacklist.

While the government has long said it is committed to that goal and has made some reforms in that direction, it has so far not signed up to an international standard on automatic sharing of tax information set by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development.

Wednesday's signing formalized an arrangement on exchanging bank account details already observed between the two countries. The US and Panama also already have a separate agreement in force on sharing tax information.

"Panama continues to advance in the area of financial and fiscal transparency," Panamanian Finance Minister Dulcidio De La Guardia said in a statement after signing the accord with US ambassador John Feeley.

He emphasized that it showed Panama was cooperating in "the fight against tax evasion, money laundering and terrorist financing."

The deal with Panama will allow the United States to monitor accounts in Panama used by US citizens and close tax evasion opportunities.

Panama signs bank account info sharing deal with US

 

[jdubnyce]

Panama signs bank account info sharing deal with US

• 
  

© AFP/File | A police car outside the Mossack-Fonseca law firm offices in Panama City during a raid on April 12, 2016
PANAMA CITY (AFP) -

Panama and the United States on Wednesday signed an agreement on sharing of back account information in a step Panama's finance minister hailed as proof of his country's cooperation in fighting tax evasion.

The bilateral agreement comes weeks after the Panama Papers, a series of reports around the world revealing how one Panamanian law firm set up offshore entities to help the world's wealthy stash their assets.

Following the revelations, Panama has come under intense international pressure to open its financial sector to greater transparency or risk being put back on an global "tax haven" blacklist.

While the government has long said it is committed to that goal and has made some reforms in that direction, it has so far not signed up to an international standard on automatic sharing of tax information set by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development.

Wednesday's signing formalized an arrangement on exchanging bank account details already observed between the two countries. The US and Panama also already have a separate agreement in force on sharing tax information.

"Panama continues to advance in the area of financial and fiscal transparency," Panamanian Finance Minister Dulcidio De La Guardia said in a statement after signing the accord with US ambassador John Feeley.

He emphasized that it showed Panama was cooperating in "the fight against tax evasion, money laundering and terrorist financing."

The deal with Panama will allow the United States to monitor accounts in Panama used by US citizens and close tax evasion opportunities.

Panama signs bank account info sharing deal with US

Many people gonna die

 

[88m3]

Many people gonna die

mucho

 

[88m3]

Hong Kong journalists protest at editor's sacking with blank columns
By Juliana LiuHong Kong correspondent, BBC News

• 27 April 2016

Image copyrightBBC Chinese
Image captionMing Pao newspaper is facing a staff revolt
For the fourth consecutive day on Wednesday, some columnists at Hong Kong's prestigious broadsheet, Ming Pao, left their spaces blank.

The unusual protest is part of an extraordinary staff revolt at the independently minded newspaper, following last week's unexpected firing of executive chief editor Keung Kwok-yuen.

The dismissal was announced on the same day the paper published front page stories linking local tyc00ns, politicians and celebrities with a law firm at the centre of the Panama Papers leak.

The newspaper said his sacking was a cost-cutting measure.

Image copyrightAP
Image captionThe protest comes amid increasing concern over Beijing's influence in the territory
But the Ming Pao Staff Association, a union that represents more than half of the paper's 300 editorial staff, has publicly said the firing was due to Mr Keung's editorial position.

In a statement following the sacking, the association called him the "soul" of the news team: "Mr Keung is a veteran journalist who has spearheaded the coverage of major controversies in Hong Kong in the past decades.

"Among them were the 2003 rally against the national security law, the 2012 campaign against national education, as well as the death of mainland political dissident Li Wang-yan."

Privately, some employees have told the BBC they believe the liberal-leaning Mr Keung was not let go because of the Panama Papers expose - but because of the forthcoming elections in Hong Kong.

Image copyrightGetty Images
Image captionStaff put up signs reading "unclear", in Chinese, following Keung Kwok-yuen's dismissal
"We fear it is related to the Legislative Council elections in September, and the chief executive selection next year," a staff member said.

'Umbrella soldiers'
This autumn, Hong Kong voters will go to the polls to elect their next group of politicians.

It is the first city-wide election since the pro-democracy protests of 2014.

Since then, some young, politically inexperienced protesters, inspired by that "Umbrella Movement", have succeeded in winning district-level elections.

And many more of these so-called "umbrella soldiers" will run for the first time in September.

Some of these groups hold more radical views than traditional pro-democracy candidates, including calling for outright independence for Hong Kong or not rejecting violence in their fight for greater rights.

"If a lot of these young candidates win, it is likely to affect who the Chinese government picks for the role of chief executive next year," said the Ming Pao staffer.

The newspaper is likely to be under pressure from the authorities to toe the line during a politically sensitive period, according to the journalist.

Image captionSome at the paper have even offered to take salary cuts, to pay for Keung Kwok-yuen's return
Ming Pao is a hugely influential newspaper.

This week, it won 15 awards at the annual Hong Kong News Awards competition, organised by the Newspaper Society of Hong Kong.

Staffers attending the ceremony dressed in black to protest against their editor's sacking.

A large photo of the group featured prominently on the paper's front page the next day.

Bruce Lui, a columnist for the paper, who wrote about the controversy this week, agrees Mr Keung was fired for his editorial stance.

He believes the editor-in-chief, Chong Tien Siong, was asked by management to rein in the outspoken newspaper when he was appointed in 2014, but has failed to do so, in part due to Mr Keung.

Mr Chong, a Malaysian journalist, is widely believed to be more pro-Beijing than Mr Keung in his editorial position.

The BBC took these allegations to Mr Chong and to Ming Pao management but he did not respond and they declined to comment.

Image copyrightGetty Images
Image captionIt is not the first time an editor at the paper has drawn the support of staff, here getting signatures in support of former editor Kevin Lau after he was stabbed by mainland Chinese attackers, shortly after being sacked in early 2014
The newspaper is owned by Malaysian billionaire Tiong Hiew King, who runs a global business empire, with operations in mainland China.

Ming Pao's management has maintained Keung Kwok-yuen's firing was an operational, not editorial, decision.

But members of the union do not accept this explanation and have demanded a meeting with top management on Wednesday.

In an unusual gesture, they have offered to cut their pay or benefits in exchange for reinstating Mr Keung.

The union has vowed to escalate its protest if it does not receive a fair explanation and settlement from management.

Hong Kong journalists protest at editor's sacking with blank columns - BBC News

 

[88m3]

dbl

 

[Hood Critic]

People are holding their breath for American names but those will undoubtedly be held for last and won't be very interesting to the general public.

Wealthy US citizens can get these types of services right here at home.

 

[hashmander]

Panama signs bank account info sharing deal with US

• 
  

© AFP/File | A police car outside the Mossack-Fonseca law firm offices in Panama City during a raid on April 12, 2016
PANAMA CITY (AFP) -

Panama and the United States on Wednesday signed an agreement on sharing of back account information in a step Panama's finance minister hailed as proof of his country's cooperation in fighting tax evasion.

The bilateral agreement comes weeks after the Panama Papers, a series of reports around the world revealing how one Panamanian law firm set up offshore entities to help the world's wealthy stash their assets.

Following the revelations, Panama has come under intense international pressure to open its financial sector to greater transparency or risk being put back on an global "tax haven" blacklist.

While the government has long said it is committed to that goal and has made some reforms in that direction, it has so far not signed up to an international standard on automatic sharing of tax information set by the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development.

Wednesday's signing formalized an arrangement on exchanging bank account details already observed between the two countries. The US and Panama also already have a separate agreement in force on sharing tax information.

"Panama continues to advance in the area of financial and fiscal transparency," Panamanian Finance Minister Dulcidio De La Guardia said in a statement after signing the accord with US ambassador John Feeley.

He emphasized that it showed Panama was cooperating in "the fight against tax evasion, money laundering and terrorist financing."

The deal with Panama will allow the United States to monitor accounts in Panama used by US citizens and close tax evasion opportunities.

Panama signs bank account info sharing deal with US

 

[88m3]

all pounds of flesh will be theirs

 

[CHL]

The dismissal was announced on the same day the paper published front page stories linking local tyc00ns, politicians and celebrities with a law firm at the centre of the Panama Papers leak.

The newspaper said his sacking was a cost-cutting measure.

 

[88m3]

Be subject to cost cutting measures, Brehs...

 

[88m3]

Panama Papers Fallout Hurts A Reputation Panama Thought It Had Fixed
4:22

• Transcript

May 4, 20163:25 PM ET
Heard on All Things Considered

CARRIE KAHN

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Panama's economy, expected to grow by 6 percent this year, is a bright spot in Latin America. Many Panamanians believe their country has been unfairly tarnished by the Panama Papers revelations.

Joe Raedle/Getty Images
Panama City is bustling with construction. At least half-a-dozen cranes dot its picturesque, oceanfront skyline, teeming with glass towers.

At one site, real estate broker Kent Davis steps into a construction elevator in a nearly completed 30-floor apartment building. Seventy percent of the apartments have already been sold.

Panama is on the rise, too. Its economy, expected to grow by 6 percent this year, is the bright spot in Latin America. The Panama Canal, which the country assumed control of in 2000, saw record traffic last year and shipments are expected only to grow after its expansion is opened next month.

But Davis says the bad press brought on by the Panama Papers has been a punch to the country's gut, hurting more than just the shady operators in the offshore industry.

"Now they are paying a price," he says, "and unfortunately, the whole country is going to suffer for a while."

The Panama Papers exposed the global business of hiding the riches of the world's famous and infamous. But for many in Panama, those papers — and the misdeeds of a handful of the country's lawyers — have unfairly damaged the country's reputation. The global shaming comes just as Panama was winning international recognition for cleaning up its act.

Panama was blindsided, says Felipe Chapman, an economist at Indesa, a local investment research firm. He says the Panama Papers give a mistaken impression that the world's rich opened all their shady companies here.

"Most of those corporations were not even incorporated in Panama," he notes. "They were incorporated in the British Virgin Islands, in the Bahamas, in Grand Cayman."

The vast majority of their money isn't in Panamanian banks, either, he says. Compared to the world's other fiscal havens, Panama has made great strides to clean up its offshore industry, he adds.

Two years ago, lawmakers passed a series of laws cracking down on money laundering. The steps got Panama removed in February from an international list of bad actors. That prompted the U.S. ambassador to say the de-listing would make 2016 Panama's year of redemption.

Instead, two months later, the Panama Papers were leaked.

Many countries that were embarrassed by the leak, including France, singled the country out for wrongdoing. The Organization of Cooperation and Development (OECD), representing the world's wealthier countries, struck, too, insisting that Panama's leaders sign long-stalled tax information exchange agreements.

Panamanians bristled. President Juan Carlos Varela went on the defensive.

Panama's success "does not depend on irregular flows of money into our financial system," Varela told a press conference last week, inaugurating a panel of experts to boost the country's financial transparency. He made a similar speech Tuesday to theWashington Conference on the Americas.

"Our success story is based on the hard work of the Panamanian people: a noble people and peace-loving nation, that despite of being a small country in terms of size and population, has found its way to earn an important place within the concert of nations," he said.

But opposition lawmaker Zulay Rodriguez Lu says Panama's leaders spend too much time hiding behind nationalistic rhetoric and should put more effort into enforcing the country's laws.

"Justice isn't truly applied to those stealing money and evading our laws," she says. The country's rich and politically connected are largely exempt, she says.

Until the Panama Papers leak last month, the co-founder of Mossack Fonseca, the law firm at the center of the scandal, was a close financial adviser to the president. Rodriguez says an investigation into the firm's activities is also a sham. NPR's requests to speak with Panama's attorney general went unanswered.

Panama responded to the pressure. Last month it signed financial sharing agreements with Japan and the U.S., and says it will with the OECD, too.

Panama has always been willing to improve transparency, says Moises Cohen, the president of Capital Bank. It just wants a level playing field.

"Small countries sign and small countries implement these rules," he says. "And the big countries like the United Kingdom and the United States don't fulfill and don't implement this in the right way. And that's a problem, no?"

Panama's offshore industry, now only a small part of the economy, will inevitably change, says economist Felipe Chapman. "It's going to die out for the uses that it has been criticized for," he says, "but it will still flourish for the desired uses."

As Panama cleans up its system, experts say, dirty money will find other havens — unless remedies are initiated and enforced worldwide.

 

[KING WILL]

Documentary out.

 

[MasterOfAllHeSurveyz]

The Laundromat was pretty good.

 

[Mook]

This is what we do now. We get mad for about 2 weeks then forget about what happened till a documentary comes out. This is the stupidest era of human history.