WASHINGTON, DC – Global Financial Integrity (GFI) lauded former UN Secretary-General Kofi Annan and the Africa Progress Panel (APP), which he chairs, for highlighting the devastating impact that illicit financial outflows have on economic development and poverty alleviation across the continent in the 2013 Africa Progress Report published today. The APP report cites GFI’s research on illicit financial flows and calls upon the G8 to require full, public disclosure of the beneficial ownership information of all corporate entities within the next year.
Voice of America (VOA) has begun an investigation into global corruption, the first segment of which aired this week, featuring the work of Task Force members Global Financial Integrity and Transparency International.
Power Outages Plunged Nearly 700 Million People Across India into the Dark this Week. Could Better Governance and a More Transparent Financial System Have Averted This?
Sometimes it can be difficult to wrap your mind around an exorbitantly large number like US$462 billion. Global Financial Integrity’s research shows that developing and emerging economies are losing astronomically large amounts of money to crime, corruption, and tax evasion each year. Indeed, our November 2010 report on India by GFI’s Lead Economist Dev Kar revealed India had lost $462 billion in illicit outflows.
This week’s massive poweroutages across the subcontinent—plunging half the country, or about 680 million people into darkness yesterday—are just one horrifying manifestation of the damage caused by poor governance and illicit outflows.
Beyond enabling tax dodging, tax haven secrecy facilitates transnational crime, financial fraud and international terrorism, writes Robert Morgenthau, the legendary former Manhattan District Attorney, in the New York Times.
Oliver Wendell Holmes, Jr. once famously wrote that “taxes are the price we pay for a civilized society”—a notion implicitly acknowledged by each of us when we file our tax returns with the IRS every April. Yet civilized society, at home and abroad, is precariously at risk today unless we do something to stem the rampant tax dodging facilitated by tax havens.
How a Chinese cave got listed on the U.S. stock market Reuters, November 30, 2011 Developing Nations Lose Billions to Multinational Tax Dodging IPS, November 28, 2011 France Strengthens Fight Against Tax Fraud Tax-News.com, November 30, 2011 Judge Tentatively Tosses Lindsey Case, First Foreign Bribery Trial Conviction Wall Street Journal, November 29, 2011 Russia’s Shrinking [...]
Avoiding Tax: Havens Above
The Economist, October 7, 2011
Ghana: Time to Dismantle Tax Haven Secrecy Jurisdictions
AllAfrica.com, October 10, 2011
Advani says yatra will focus on black money, launches theme song
The Times of India, October 10, 2011
Nigeria won’t progress while corruption is ‘just the way it is’
The Gaurdian, October 10, 2011
Indian Americans to hold anti-corruption protest in New York on Oct 16
The Times of India, October 10, 2011
PARIS – Day 1 of the Task Force Conference is now behind us, and we’re about to begin our second day. While we get set to hear panels on Anti-Money Laundering, Trade Mispricing, Trafficking in Illicit Goods, Corrupt Dictators & the Arab Spring, IUU Fishing, and more today, check out a selection of photos from yesterday’s festivities in our Flickr slideshow below.
Also, remember that you can watch the conference live on our website in French (HERE) and English (HERE).
The live-stream is now working! You can watch the full #TFConf2011 now online in French and English at http://ow.ly/6PfUd
Problèmes techniques réglés! Vous pouvez maintenant suivre la conférence #TFConf2011FR en live, en français et anglais sur http://ow.ly/6PgqO
The 2011 annual Task Force conference is now underway in Paris, France. You can watch a live stream of the conference broadcast in both French (here) and English (here).
You can also participate with the conference on Twitter. We’re accepting questions for each panel via Twitter at #TFConf2011 (for English) and #TFConf2011fr (for French).
It pains me to report that The Economist published a shoddy piece of journalism today on the U.S. Foreign Corrupt Practices Act. The article can be read in full here.
Heather Lowe, Legal Counsel and Director of Government Affairs at Global Financial Integrity, has responded to the article by publishing the following comment on The Economist’s website:
I am quite surprised by both the tenor and lack of critical analysis in this particular piece. It is important that Economist readers understand the following:
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