THE ECONOMIST CALLS ON U.S.,U.K.,DEVELOPED COUNTRIES TO CLEAN UP THEIR OWN BACKYARD.
Cover Page Editorial & 10 article "Special Report" highlight Trillions of dollars in Dirty Money flows facilitated by Delaware,Miami,City of London and offshore Tax Havens.
Raymond Baker,the Director of Global Financial Integrity (GFI),a Washington DC based research and advocacy organisation,released the following statement :
"Offshore secrecy jurisdictions and developed western economies facilitated the illicit outflow of nearly $6 trillion in dirty money from developing countries over the past decade.This is an astronomically large amount of money.We are talking about nearly $6 trillion that could have been used to invest in Health care,education,pull people out of poverty and save lives. Instead the money is sitting in bank accounts in Miami,London and Zurich owned by anonymous shell companies and trusts registered in Delaware,the British Virgin Islands and Luxembourg.
This report should be a wake up call G 20 leaders meeting in Moscow this week,as well as legislators in Washington and London,that action must be taken to eliminate anonymous shell companies,to enforce strong anti money laundering controls at International banks,to force multinational corporations to open their books and to collect and exchange tax information automatically between jurisdictions".
