G20 ministers urged to use oligarch crackdown to tackle tax havens
G20 countries are being urged by a group of renowned economists to use the crackdown on oligarchs’ wealth amid Ukraine sanctions as a spur to tackle tax havens once and for all.
An open letter sent to the 20 finance ministers before they meet on Tuesday called on them to implement a global register to link assets, companies and structures to their owners so they could no longer deprive countries of what they owed.
Its 14 signatories – all commissioners of anti-tax avoidance group the Independent Commission for the Reform of International Corporate Taxation (ICRICT) – include the economists Gabriel Zucman, Joseph Stiglitz and Thomas Piketty, as well as the French investigative judge Eva Joly.
They argued that the concentration of extreme wealth hidden in tax havens was increasing inequality and impoverishing the poorest in society, and demanded reform of an international financial system that was “skewed in favour of wealthy tax abusers”.
Since the start of the pandemic, the world’s richest people have seen their wealth double to $1.5tn (£1.01tn), yet the ICRICT commissioners found the gap between rich and poor had only widened during that time, a situation that had been exacerbated by the conflict in Ukraine and had left many of the poorest facing a cost of living crisis and soaring energy and food bills.
They wrote that members of the global elite often hid their wealth “through elaborate structures to avoid paying taxes, but also to hide money generated by corruption and illegal activities … Global finance allows tax abuses, corruption and money laundering to flourish.”
Attempts to sanction assets belonging to Russian oligarchs after Vladimir Putin’s invasion had highlighted what the signatories caled the “wall of opacity”
Read more on theguardian.com
