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  1. #51
    Molecular Mixup
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    Quote Originally Posted by Kurgen
    I sold them all in 2010, because if I was going to become Prime Minister I didn't want anyone to say you have other agendas, vested interests.
    Very noble of him , he then invested the money in property, and made sure that market was rigged never to fall ,thanks to strick planning restrictions .lax money laundering laws, ever increasing immigration , low interest rates etc

  2. #52
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    Quote Originally Posted by blue View Post
    Cameron stepped in to shield offshore trusts from EU tax crackdown in 2013



    here we go
    what a surprise..

    Cameron stepped in to shield offshore trusts from EU tax crackdown in 2013 | Politics | The Guardian
    David Cameron intervened personally to prevent offshore trusts from being dragged into an EU-wide crackdown on tax avoidance, it has emerged.
    In a letter to the then president of the European council, Herman Van Rompuy, in 2013, the prime minister said that trusts should not automatically be subject to the same transparency requirements as companies.

    Richard Burgon, a shadow Treasury minister, said: “Another day and another story emerges which exposes what the Conservative party really thinks in its heart of hearts about tackling tax avoidance.
    “It’s time that they treated tax avoidance as the serious matter people across Britain know it is. And one way they can do that is to stop trying to block or undermine measures to tackle it.”
    Judith Sargentini, a Dutch MEP who led the European parliament’s work on the draft law, told the Financial Times that the UK’s argument against a crackdown on trusts was that it would be an invasion of privacy - and that trusts have a special role in Britain in helping families manage issues around inheritance.
    “I saw it [the British position] as a danger and a possible loophole,” Sargentini said. “Some member states saw it as an underhand way for the UK to get an advantage.”
    Did he do anything to protect the rights of dead pigs to give blow jobs? He should have been gone after that was revealed.

  3. #53
    euston has flown

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    Not really a resigning issue, normal behaviour for an public schoolboy.... a top job and a strange fetish. fucking a dead pigs head well..... what we would expect of him and one the mild end of the perversion spectrum for these chaps....

    As for the money. Its not the 30k, its not that it was offshore, its more the persistent wilful evasion of asset declaration rules, its a level of financial dishonesty which makes him unfit for public office.
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  4. #54
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    I imagine he will resign anyway when Britain votes to leave the EU, only 2 1/2 months to go till we have our 'independence day'.

  5. #55
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    Even if we stay in , he still has to go and Osborne.

  6. #56
    Molecular Mixup
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    hahjah no fan of ken but he's called this one right


    Ken Livingstone says David Cameron should not only resign, but he should go to prison

    Ken Livingstone, the former Mayor of London, has told the TV channel RT that David Cameron should face a term behind bars.
    "I think it is incredibly damaging. All this started with Mrs Thatcher. She stopped all the regulation; people were allowed to move their money abroad, start not paying their taxes. And Cameron’s father just spent 30 years laundering money through Panama and did not pay a penny of tax to Britain. And then his son was in denial, refusing to be honest about all of this.
    But, also, it’s the hypocrisy. Four years ago during the mayoral election he was accusing me of tax avoidance. In fact, I had overpaid tax, and he knew full well that if you want to do tax avoidance you launder your money abroad, as his father was doing. So I do think Cameron is the most hypocritical prime minister of my lifetime."
    Asked if Mr Cameron should resign, Mr Livingstone added:
    "I think he should have resigned right when he started his term of office. It has been the most damaging government. Huge damage to the poorest people, to communities that desperately need investment and so on. Cameron’s government for the last six years has been about a small elite getting richer whilst the poorer get left behind. He shouldn’t just resign. He should be sent to prison."


    Panama Papers: David Cameron's approval ratings drop below Jeremy Corbyn's as he faces inquiry into undeclared stake in offshore trust


  7. #57
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    Wow, powerful words

  8. #58
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    The bbc make Putin seem like a piece of shit using his mates to take care of dosh
    and getting as many as possible to say Cameron is innocent of any wrong doing.
    they must be on acid.

    melt down. its all imploding.

  9. #59
    Molecular Mixup
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    This protest might be interesting, on sat morning :

    David Cameron protest: More than a thousand protesters to descend on Downing Street over PM's offshore links

    David Cameron: close tax loopholes or resign!



    IMPORTANT NEWS: we're getting the tropical offshore vibes started an hour early! Don your most garish hawaiian shirt, practice your calypso moves and head down to 10 Downing Street for 11.00 am. We promise you won't want to be late.

    Because so many UK companies are based in Panama, the British Virgin Islands and other tropical tax haven hotspots we want to make them feel at home. So lets dress for the occasion!

    Hawaiian shirts, tropical colours, sunglasses and (of course) Panama hats. If you've got a blow up beach ball then bring that along.

    Why should Tories get to have all the offshore fun?

  10. #60
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    TO: GOVERNMENT

    It is our wish that the UK Prime Minister, David Cameron, resign from his post for Deception and Conflict of Interest

    Why is this important?

    For Lying over Syria, Tax Credits, Budget Cuts, Tax Haven, Bailouts, EU-Brexit, Immigration; Crushing the economy, health & social care, human & disability rights, education, employment, steel, housing, social security, pensions; Spreading blood in class, race, political, ideological and hate wars; For increasing taxation, homelessness, warfare, censorship, surveillance, MP's salaries, corruption and cover-ups; For your living wage below the breadline;

    For your hypocrisy and arrogance re. your Tax Haven inheritance and as such, your CONFLICT OF INTEREST; For deaths in Syria and the vulnerable in the UK; For a fraudulent campaign and appointment and for using the office as a political manoeuvre to solely benefit your rich masters. For failing miserably as a prime minister and as a human being.

    UK people feel betrayed, do not agree with and do not trust David Cameron as Prime Minister, and does not wish to be associated with David Cameron.

    https://you.38degrees.org.uk/petitio...ct-of-interest

    Cameron is doing a sterling job for the brexit campaign


  11. #61
    Thailand Expat misskit's Avatar
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    AMLO launches probe into 16 Thai nationals listed on Panama Papers

    BANGKOK, 8 April 2016 (NNT) - The Anti-Money Laundering Office (AMLO) has launched investigation into 16 Thai nationals whose names appeared in Panama Papers scandals but it is not clear as yet whether they broke the anti-money laundering law.

    Acting AMLO secretary genral Seehanat Prayoonrat said the agency is checking out with its Panama counterpart and the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) to help verify the names of those Thai nationals.

    The investigation into possible money laundering charges is currently at an early stage and the authorities have so far found no evidence of wrongdoing, he said. AMLO would not release the names of the individuals until the authorities have verified the leaked information pertaining to those Thai nationals, who had allegedly done businesses overseas with the help of a legal firm in Panama.

    - See more at: ?????????????????? : AMLO launches probe into 16 Thai nationals listed on Panama Papers

  12. #62
    Molecular Mixup
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    Quote Originally Posted by Chittychangchang
    Cameron is doing a sterling job for the brexit campaign
    oh i hope its true
    but i have a nasty feeling there are thick as shit voters who see vile Cameron as a reason to vote to stay in , under the illusion the EU can protect them from people like him ...

  13. #63
    Thailand Expat OhOh's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by hazz
    As for the money. Its not the 30k, its not that it was offshore, its more the persistent wilful evasion of asset declaration rules, its a level of financial dishonesty which makes him unfit for public office.
    One suspects it's the lifestyle his family and his wife's family have lived since they were children, when students, when possibly being considered for a safe constituency and rising unopposed through the political hierarchy to become the UK PM. All of which would not have been hurt by judicious application of brown envelopes by his father's trust administrators.

    One wonders why the Ameristani backed investigators have not named all offenders, irrespective of political or religious convictions. One also wonders why the Ameristani government does not close down similar organisations situated on Ameristani soil. Or is Ameristan on of the "exceptional" countries which are above international agreements - money laundering, illegal invasions, UNCLOS ......

    Edit?

    Link to report showing probable Ameristani exceptional practises:

    https://www.rt.com/op-edge/338782-us...panama-papers/
    Last edited by OhOh; 09-04-2016 at 01:50 PM.
    A tray full of GOLD is not worth a moment in time.

  14. #64
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    Cameron Inc: The father with the Ł20m property empire, the step-father with a 20,000-acre estate and the mother who founded a Ł30m company... You thought Dave and Sam were super-rich, now meet the rest of the family!

    1. Samantha Cameron
    Income: Career with upmarket stationery firm Smythson saw her become creative director and build up a 2.7 per cent personal stake in the company.
    When the firm was bought out for Ł15.8 million in 2005, she received Ł437,000 for her shares and got a second pay-out (estimated to be Ł40,000) in 2009.
    Her salary as creative director was said to be Ł400,000 in 2010, but when her husband became PM, she opted to work part-time as ‘creative consultant’ on a reported Ł100,000 a year.
    Smythson’s own tax arrangements have come under scrutiny. The Mail revealed last year that it was owned by Greenwill SA, a secretive firm based in Luxembourg, which itself was controlled by the Barracuda Trust, a Guernsey-based organisation.
    We wrote that no UK tax had been paid on the roughly Ł1 million of dividends paid in previous years to Greenwill SA. And, if Smythson were ever sold, for a profit, the secretive foreign owner could also escape UK capital gains tax and stamp duty.

    2. Sir Reginald Sheffield
    Who: Samantha’s father.
    Wealth: Cameron once embarrassingly joked: ‘Samantha owns a field in Scunthorpe.’
    In fact, her father, Sir Reginald Sheffield, owns property and land estimated at more than Ł20 million, has more than 3,000 acres of arable land, Grade I-listed stately country home Sutton Park, an 18th-century Georgian house north of York, a home in London and a hall near Scunthorpe.


    3. Annabel Astor
    Who: SamCam’s mother.
    Wealth: Born into wealth. Her grandfather was Sir Roderick Jones, chairman of Reuters, and as a child was brought up in London’s Hyde Park Gate, next door to Winston Churchill.
    Married into two wealthy families, first to Sir Reginald Sheffield and then to the 4th Viscount Astor.
    Co-founder and chief executive of furnishings retailer OKA, which was valued at Ł30 million in 2006 and which made Ł1.7 million profits last year. Half its shares are owned via a Guernsey-based company.


    4. 4th Viscount Astor
    Who: William Waldorf Astor III (Samantha Cameron’s stepfather).
    Wealth: His great-grandfather, the 1st Viscount Astor, was believed to be the wealthiest man in America, with business interests spanning newspapers and New York’s Waldorf Hotel.
    His grandparents owned Cliveden, the Buckinghamshire stately home at the centre of the Profumo scandal. Has a total of four properties — including the 20,000-acre Tarbert Estate on the Hebridean island of Jura, which has been held offshore in the name of a Bahamas-registered company, Ginge Manor Estates.
    (Just as Cameron’s father named his off-shore trust after a family ancestral home, Ginge Manor is the name of the Astors’ stately pile in Oxfordshire.)
    The Viscount has complained about land reform plans by the ruling Scottish Nationalist Party which he feared might force him to sell some of his land — calling them a ‘Mugabe-style land-grab’.

    5. William Waldorf Astor IV
    Who: Samantha’s half-brother.
    Wealth: Businessman who owns 75 out of the 200 shares in Long Harbour Ltd, a company which invests in the freeholds of blocks of flats and retirement developments. It made profits of Ł9.9 million in 2014 but only paid Ł948,000 in UK tax.
    While there’s no suggestion there is anything illegal in the company’s tax arrangements, the UK tax bill was reduced because Ł1.09 million worth of the profits were made by subsidiaries in Guernsey and the Isle of Man.
    Long Harbour Ltd paid Ł565,000 in advisory fees to a British Virgin Islands-based company called Atlantic Property Management, which owns 50 of Long Harbour’s shares.


    6. David Cameron
    Income: Salary of Ł150,000 as Prime Minister (having voluntarily cut his pay to that of other Cabinet ministers).
    Inheritance: Ł300,000 in cash from his father Ian Cameron’s will (below the inheritance tax threshold).
    Properties: West London family home in Ladbroke Grove, bought in 2006 for Ł1.125 million. After a major refurbishment, including a new basement and side extension, it is now worth Ł3.5 million. The property has been let since the Camerons moved to No 10. Similar properties fetch Ł7,000 a month, so they may have made more than Ł500,000 in rental since 2010.
    Cameron’s constituency house is in the Oxfordshire village of Dean. Bought for Ł650,000 in 2001 when he took out a Ł350,000 mortgage — with the interest payments covered by taxpayers as part of his MP’s expenses.
    In 2011, the Camerons paid Ł137,000 for a neighbouring parcel of land from a millionaire lobbyist peer friend. The house is now worth Ł1.3 million.
    Investments: At first this week, Cameron denied having any current interest in an overseas trust. But he was then forced to admit he had profited from a Ł12,497 investment he and his wife made in 1997 in an offshore holding owned his father.
    He said he sold the shares in January 2010 — four months before he became Prime Minister — pocketing a tax-free profit of just over Ł19,000.
    Cameron said on Thursday: ‘I paid income tax on the dividends, but there was a profit on it, but it was less than the capital gains tax allowance, so I didn’t pay capital gains tax, but it was subject to all the UK taxes in all the normal ways.’
    He’s said he has no shares, but some cash savings. However, he has owned shares in the past — reportedly in Carlton Communications (where he worked before becoming an MP) and Ł40,000 worth in Urbium, which runs nightclubs such as Tiger Tiger in London and for which he was a non-executive director.


    7. Ian Cameron
    Who: David’s father, who died aged 77 in 2010.
    Career: First worked in the stock-broking firm Panmure Gordon, where his father was director. Became a director himself until the company was sold in the 1980s — earning him a reported Ł2 million windfall.
    Then set up Blairmore Holdings (named after the family’s ancestral home in Aberdeenshire), an investment trust based in the Bahamas which has managed tens of millions of pounds on behalf of wealthy families.
    He chaired an investment fund in Jersey, held shares in Blairmore Asset Management in Geneva and set up Blairmore Holdings in Panama. The trust was the subject of this week’s revelations in the so-called ‘Panama Papers’ because he was exposed as a client of the law firm Mossack Fonseca, from whom the documents were leaked.
    In 2008 (when his son was leader of the Opposition), he took legal advice about the pros and cons of different tax havens — such as the Cayman Islands and Bermuda. Blairmore’s directors wanted to continue to avoid paying UK taxes. Then, in June 2012, Blairmore was moved to Ireland, another tax haven with many of the advantages of the more distant offshore jurisdictions.
    Income: Was paid Ł12,400 a year as director, but will almost certainly have had a large personal interest in the fund. The year before his death, his fortune was estimated at Ł10 million.
    Legacy: His will detailed wealth of just Ł2.74 million. But it listed only UK-held assets. The document was published in Jersey and an investigation by Channel 4 News revealed he kept part of his wealth in the tax haven.
    A grant of probate was filed with courts on the Channel island, a process that only happens with a minimum of Ł10,000 assets. The full value does not have to be disclosed.
    There were also substantial chattels left to his widow, Mary. Two paintings from his home in Peasemore, Berkshire, were sold for Ł800,000 in 2006.


    8. Mary Cameron
    Who: David’s mother and the daughter of Sir William Mount, Army officer and businessman who became director of the Miles Aircraft Company and High Sheriff of Berkshire.
    Wealth: Few details exist of what she was left in her husband’s will. Likely, though, she’s still a beneficiary of Blairmore Holdings.
    David Cameron’s statements this week declared that neither he, his wife nor his children were beneficiaries of any offshore trust but he did not mention his mother.


    9. Alexander Cameron
    Who: Cameron’s elder brother. A leading English barrister.
    Career: According to Who’s Who Legal 2014, the ‘terrific’ 52-year-old QC is head of chambers and a ‘master of criminal law’, who ‘especially excels at intricate fraud, bribery and corruption matters’. Clients rave about his ‘spot-on judgment’.
    Figures that were revealed as a result of a Freedom of Information request in 2011 showed he was paid Ł1.13 million in legal aid over a period of ten years.
    Wealth: Ownership of his childhood home, the Old Rectory in Peasemore, Berkshire, was transferred to him in 2006 in order to reduce the size of his father’s estate before he died. It was then worth Ł2.5 million and is now valued at Ł3.7 million.

    10. Tania Brookes
    Who: Cameron’s elder sister. Married to a consultant cardiologist and lives in a Ł900,000 house near Tadley, Hampshire.
    Wealth: On her father’s death, she and her younger sister, Clare, each received a share in a property in London’s Kensington. Tania receiving a controlling share of 51 per cent and her younger sister 49 per cent.


    11. Clare Cameron
    Who: Cameron’s second sister.
    Wealth: Married to Jeremy Fawcus, the son of the former chief of staff at the supreme HQ of Allied Forces Europe. The Fawcus family home was Flowton Hall, near Ipswich, Suffolk, which was sold in 2013 for around Ł800,000.
    Her husband is chief executive of Firefish, a marketing agency he founded. They live in a Ł1.8 million house in Shepherd’s Bush. Left a share of another London property in her father’s will.


    12. Ewen Donald Cameron
    Who: Cameron’s grandfather. Died in 1958.
    Career: Director of stockbrokers Panmure Gordon. Born into wealth. Inherited Blairmore House, a mansion built by his ancestor in the 1880s.
    Legacy: He left Ł57,000 in his will (the equivalent of more than Ł1 million today). Blairmore House was sold during the 1940s and is now a retreat centre run by the international evangelical group Ellel Ministries.



    Read more: David and Samantha Cameron are not the only ones in the family with a large bank balance | Daily Mail Online
    Follow us: @MailOnline on Twitter | DailyMail on Facebook
    I would post pictures but life's too short.

  15. #65
    Thailand Expat OhOh's Avatar
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    Cameroon is not in anyway mentioned in any "secret" wills/trust fund agreements and if he is, he will donate all such awards to HMRC, as a donation - all UK citizens can do this.

    Or will not be put forward, or accept in the future, by any "world organisation" position when leaving his current, more heavily regulated, political position.



    Blair probably made a similar statement.
    Last edited by OhOh; 09-04-2016 at 01:50 PM.

  16. #66
    Thailand Expat OhOh's Avatar
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  17. #67
    R.I.P.

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    Panama Papers reveal a two-tier global economy

    What the Panama Papers reveal isn't just some dodgy legal practices by a few oligarchs and corporations. It's the exposure of alternative economic infrastructure designed to keep wealth in the hands of the few, writes Tim Dunlop.

    No sooner had the Panama Papers dropped than I noticed a bunch of people jump in with tweets and articles and Facebook posts pleading with us to understand that a lot of this activity is legal and that there are often profoundly good reasons for setting up anonymous bank accounts in offshore locations. We shouldn't presume everyone involved is doing something illegal or immoral, they counselled.
    This is obviously true. And you know what? Cry me a river.




    Let's not get distracted here. The focus should very much be on the problem these revelations have uncovered, not the niceties of mitigation. As the New York Times editorialised:
    The papers chronicle a global industry developed to enable an international elite enriched by corrupt or illegal means to conceal its wealth and dealings from taxation, prosecution and public wrath. They expose the questionable riches that public officials have concealed, whether in Iceland, Russia, China, Saudi Arabia or Malaysia.
    And Matthew Yglesias at Vox makes the key point that none of this happened despite the best of efforts of governments to stop it, but because they allowed it:
    [The Panama papers] offer the most granular look ever at a banal reality that's long been hiding in plain sight. Even as the world's wealthiest and most powerful nations have engaged in increasingly complex and intensive efforts at international cooperation to smooth the wheels of global commerce, they have willfully chosen to allow the wealthiest members of Western society to shield their financial assets from taxation (and in many cases divorce or bankruptcy settlement) by taking advantage of shell companies and tax havens.
    If Panama or the Cayman Islands were acting to undermine the integrity of the global pharmaceutical patent system, the United States would stop them. But the political elite of powerful Western nations have not acted to stop relatively puny Caribbean nations from undermining the integrity of the global tax system - largely because Western economic elites don't want them to.
    To see how politicians enable this sort of behaviour consider the 2011 free trade agreement signed between Panama and the United States.
    Accompanying documents to this agreement had specific clauses inserted that exempted scrutiny of Panama's tax havens.


    As the Public Citizen website reported, sensitive to claims about the possibility of tax evasion, "The Obama administration announced a new Tax Information Exchange Agreement with Panama." Which sounds great, except they also included "a loophole ... [that] allows Panama to sidestep new tax transparency provisions if they are 'contrary to the public policy' of Panama, an interesting concept for a country that earns much of its revenue by providing strict banking secrecy and tax-free status for foreign firms incorporated there."
    At the time, a certain Senator, Bernie Sanders, warned about the problems that might cause. In a speech on the topic, he said:
    Panama is a world leader when it comes to allowing wealthy Americans and large corporations to evade US taxes by stashing their cash in off-shore tax havens. And, the Panama Free Trade Agreement would make this bad situation much worse.
    Nonetheless, the free trade agreement was enacted (and yes, in case you were wondering in the context of the current US presidential election, Hillary Clinton supported it).


    Let's be very clear. What we are seeing with these revelations isn't just the uncovering of some dodgy legal practices by a few oligarchs and too-big-to-care corporations. It is the exposure of alternative economic infrastructure designed to keep wealth in the hands of the few.


    Yes, you can have lovely arguments about the difference between tax avoidance and tax minimisation, and so let's concede the point: not all tax minimisers are tax avoiders. But such arguments miss the bigger issue.
    Money is taken out of national economies - tax is avoided - and socked away where governments and the citizens they are meant to represent no longer benefit from it.


    While this is happening, governments are enacting policies of austerity and giving us little lectures about "living within our means". We are told by business lobby groups and their mouthpieces in the media and in the parliament that we need to cut the penalty rates for some of the lowest paid workers in the country, while they argue for tax cuts for corporations.


    And let's not forget, recent information released by the Australian Tax Office showed that one-third of big companies in our great democratic nation paid precisely zero tax.


    No, not everyone who avoids tax is a thief engaging in illegal activity. But what the Panama Papers begin to throw a light on is that we have created a two-tier global economy, sometimes tacitly and sometimes explicitly supported by governments throughout the world, that has allowed a tiny elite to exempt themselves from the rules the rest of us are forced to play by.


    And here's another thing, and it might be the most amazing fact to emerge from the 11.5 million leaked documents that make up the Panama Papers.
    Mossack Fonseca, the law firm at the centre of the revelations, is the world's fourth largest offshore law firm.
    That means there are three other bigger organisations engaged in the same activities.


    So as mind-boggling as this document dump is - as devastating as it is in revealing the workings of this elite black economy - it is likely that you ain't seen nothing yet.


    Panama Papers reveal a two-tier global economy - The Drum (Australian Broadcasting Corporation)

  18. #68
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    The not-completely-crazy theory that Russia leaked the Panama Papers

    On the face of it, the Panama Papers don't look good for Russia. Reporters investigating the huge leak of financial data from a Panamanian legal firm have suggested that up to $2 billion in offshore bank accounts could be linked to a circle of friends closely associated with President Vladimir Putin. For many, this information seems to corroborate what has long been rumored: that Putin is corrupt, on a huge scale.

    After a few days of silence, the Russian president himself has taken aim at the allegations, suggesting they were part of a broader U.S. plot to destabilize Russia. But another very different theory is making the rounds in the Russia-watching world. In short, the theory says that Moscow isn't a victim of a Panama Papers plot.

    Instead, perhaps it is the Russians who are behind the leak.

    Okay, it sounds far-fetched, but this particular idea is especially noteworthy because of who has advanced it: Clifford Gaddy, an economist who works with the Brookings Institution. Gaddy is one of the foremost Western experts on Russia's economy and a former adviser to the Russian Finance Ministry in the 1990s. Along with Fiona Hill of Brookings, he is one of the co-authors of a well-regarded book on the personality of the Russian leader, "Mr. Putin: Operative in the Kremlin."

    In a blog post published Thursday on the Brookings website, Gaddy outlined his thoughts on the matter. You should read it all for yourself, but I'll break down his idea into four quick points.

    It was a hacker backed by the Russian government who emailed the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung to offer the leak in early 2015, the initial contact that would eventually lead to the release of the Panama Papers.
    There's deliberately little information within the Panama Papers that harms Putin: While the $2 billion figure has been reported widely, the link to Putin is relatively obscure, and the Russian president has survived far worse accusations of corruption.
    Meanwhile, there's plenty of information in the Panama Papers that has already proven extremely embarrassing for other world leaders. At the least, Gaddy argues, this makes Putin and his reputation for corruption seem like less of an outlier and more of standard operating practice.
    The fact that so few Americans have been linked to the Panama Papers could suggest that their details were deleted from the documents given to Süddeutsche Zeitung and passed on to other media outlets. If this is true, Gaddy suggests that the lack of this information in the release means that it could be being held back for blackmail purposes.
    It's a bold claim, Gaddy admitted in an email Friday, and one that he isn't totally sure of himself. "It's certainly not a theory, hardly even a 'hypothesis,'" Gaddy wrote, adding that it was "more a suggestion of something that ought to be seriously investigated."

    Even so, this suggestion has caused a bit of a stir in the Russia-watching world. Karen Dawisha, an academic who also studies Russian corruption closely, tweeted Friday that despite her respect for Gaddy, his latest idea has failed to convince her.

    Others offered carefully worded praise. Russian American journalist Masha Gessen called it "excellent conspirology" on Facebook, while Brian Whitmore of Radio Free Europe/Radio Liberty suggested in a tweet that Gaddy was "trolling" the Kremlin.

    There are certainly parts of the idea that make a lot of sense. For one, it seems clear that the $2 billion stuff hasn't really hit Putin hard, while some other world leaders who have fraught relations with Russia -- for example, Britain's David Cameron and Ukraine's Petro Poroshenko -- are being seriously rocked by their own links to the scandal.

    Why isn't Putin facing a domestic scandal? Well, part of it is simply that Putin is an enormously popular figure in Russia, and it would take a seriously enormous financial scandal to really knock him down. Additionally, many critics are already sure Putin is corrupt — allegations of the Russian president's wealth go as high as $200 billion, which would easily make him the richest man on earth — and it's hard to see how the relatively loose links between Putin and the $2 billion moved through Panama could really shift anyone's thinking on the matter.

    Of course, there are other parts of the idea that don't fit together. For one thing, while the lack of U.S. citizens has been widely noted, there are, in fact, a few American links to the Panama Papers. (See this article from McClatchy for details.) It's also possible that more names could come out as more scrutiny is given to the vast amounts of data in the leak. Or perhaps it's just that Americans prefer tax havens other than Panama (as The Washington Post's Scott Higham reports, U.S. citizens are thought to favor more secure havens such as the Isle of Man, the Cayman Islands and Switzerland).

    https://www.washingtonpost.com/news/...mepage%2Fstory

  19. #69
    Thailand Expat OhOh's Avatar
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    It was never in question, that it was Putin's fault.

    I am surprised that Cameroon was exposed. Is he so bad, or is somebody taking some pleasure in his discomfort?

    Considering this:

    "Tally to this date:Files 186 Pages 670, Files reportedly in disclosure: 11.5 Million, Released to date: .00161%.

    Wow, talk about selective use of data.

    Time taken to release so far - 1 year? Estimated total time release - 621 years"


    No mention of Boris's past yet, has he taken the Kings shilling already?


    Another comment from the link probably seems more likely.


    "Dear stupid, pathetic fucking wankers:

    We know we assist in laundering money from some of the worst criminal oligarchs, drug dealers and corrupt public officials on the planet. We are not 'your government' so fuck your comically useless laws. They were created by the exact same individuals that need to hide their bribes, shady deals and criminal proceeds from you gullible taxpayers and other law-abiding citizens.

    If the criminal politicians did not create the laws directly for themselves, then they created them for banks, Wall Street, and especially the real estate and luxury goods 'industry'. How do we know? Because we help your government leaders hide the fucking BRIBES they get from lobbyists in those industries to influence the laws.

    Don't bitch to us about your corrupt, thieving governments or their broken lawmaking. We didn't elect those bastards - YOU did. YOU consented to be ass-raped by your political leaders, banks and Wall Street time and time again. Don't fucking deny it, and don't try to 'fix' your problem by blaming us. Your laws are meant to punish little people, not the important, monied people we deal with, so kindly fuck off.

    And if you are writing from the U.S., the most popular tax-haven in the world, then fuck you doubly. While your corrupt government's IRS insists on the world being their collection department, your government willingly and purposefully assists every other corrupt foreign national to hide their loot in the U.S. with no chance of recovery.

    We hope this clears up things in your little peon brains for now.

    Sincerely,
    Mossack Fonseca"


    Panama Partners In Crime | Zero Hedge

  20. #70
    Thailand Expat OhOh's Avatar
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    Sky news channel have published allegedly Cameroon's latest annual financial statement. Salary, "gifts from his mother and rent from his London house.

    Should he donate his house rental and capital gains to HMRC, as the UK taxpayer is providing him with a home, or will he walk away with it all courtesy of the UK taxpayers?

    Cameron Releases His Hundreds of Thousands of Dollars Income Data

  21. #71
    Thailand Expat Airportwo's Avatar
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    Reckon there may be some truth in this

  22. #72
    Thailand Expat CaptainNemo's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by BobR View Post
    Quote Originally Posted by VocalNeal View Post
    Quote Originally Posted by harrybarracuda View Post
    Quote Originally Posted by VocalNeal View Post
    I don't see what is wrong with offshore assets. It only seems that jealous people without offshore accounts seem to care.
    Duh.

    Three words: Ill gotten gains.
    Not all people who have offshore account have ill gotten gains. They simple wish to retain some semblance of privacy. Especially financial privacy.

    Not really any different to a developer in Thailand selling property and having the money deposited say in Hong Kong. Or a Thai based company manufacturing parts that they sell from an on-line shop in Germany where all the prices are in Euros and the money is transferred to...
    Bankruptcy fraud and the avoidance of paying lawsuit judgments, or hiding money from an ex spouse are the only reasons for keeping legitimately earned money offshore other than tax evasion.
    Quote Originally Posted by hazz View Post
    Quote Originally Posted by VocalNeal View Post
    I don't see what is wrong with offshore assets. It only seems that jealous people without offshore accounts seem to care.
    its a bit like those people who live on benefits with no intention of ever looking for a job.... but in this case its rich people freeloading by not paying tax in the country they reside.
    Yes, what you're talking about is people cheating in the game... not playing by the rules we all agree to, to get ahead somehow, by guile rather than effort.

    Quote Originally Posted by hazz View Post
    Quote Originally Posted by niddhog
    Offshore: Nothing wrong
    Hidden offshore: Wrong
    Hidden offshore filled with money siphoned off from the government: Up against the wall wrong
    one of the really big issue of offshore is profit laundering. international companies avoiding paying tax in the countries where they trade buying, manufacturing and processing then selling to their offshore company and zero profit.... when then sells to their own business that trade in the countries they sell their product with a massive markup to ensure these operations make little profit. and lets not forget the high interest loans their off shore companies make to their onshore businesses.

    This artificial efficiency created by shifting profit tax free offshore, freeloading. allows them to operate at a lower cost then their local competition... the result is these local businesses get bought or put out of business.
    Its one of the factors helping monsanto take over much of the global agricultural seed market, try buying non bt cotton in india.

    This is legal, done in plain sight and would argue kills the argument
    Offshore: Nothing wrong
    Yes, there's a bit of cheating going on, in terms of business deals.
    Licencing of some kinds of business where access in controlled is perhaps a better way of doing this, like in the medical, or space and defence industry, for example.

    Quote Originally Posted by harrybarracuda View Post
    Quote Originally Posted by cyrille View Post
    What would you say are the reasons why people seek financial 'privacy', Neal, apart from evading tax and concealing dubious sources of income?
    To avoid embarrassment (cf. Jimmy Carr).
    It's essentially a question of morality, which is where the embarrassment comes from.

    Cameron's error, which seems to be the thing consistently notbeing focussed on by the mass media is that Cameron was reported as stating:

    "Mr Cameron denounced the stand-up comic Jimmy Carr as "morally wrong" for putting his earnings into a "very dodgy tax avoiding scheme"."
    David Cameron joins the attacks on Jimmy Carr over 'morally wrong' scheme to avoid tax | UK Politics | News | The Independent

    This is the problem with him having benefited in the past from some kind of "tax efficient" (or whatever euphemism you prefer) scheme.

    It's like the John Major "Back to Basics" rubbish, that ultimately did for his Conservative government (ironically the one elected on the highest vote ever!) back in the 90s, when we discovered so much "Sleaze", as it was called.

    When politicians start wading into morality, they find they are soon swimming with piranhas and sharks.


    So what is the answer to that question - why does anyone *need* financial "privacy"?

    When we talk about privacy normally, we think of sexual habits that might cause embarrassment; or being seen in the nude, which might cause embarrassment; or emotional intimacy, which might cause embarrassment - or vulnerability; or being in hospital or the doctor's or in grief at a loss, and feeling not so much embarrassment, but vulnerability.
    So what we are really talking about when we talk about privacy, is vulnerability to some kind of attack, not physical, but reputational, some sort of humiliation or loss of power... and there's the nub of it... *it*, like so many things, is about power.
    These miraculously powerful people - the gods of our day; the "masters of the universe"; the jugglers of numbers - might feel vulnerable; powerless; exposed, in ways that the rest of the population are... and may share in the vicissitudes of life that the rest of us are... and this is the heart of the moral question... what makes them so different and special? Are they above countries, laws, and all the pressures and obligations that afflict the rest?
    I'm far from being a lefty, despite all that, and I do resent the invasive arm of the state and all the slimy lefty vermin who want to hold creative, productive, innovative people back, and suck away all their wealth to distribute amongst the meek who form their powerbases, but I equally detest corruption, cronyism, and nepotism, and see it as the essence of evil - I guess the same reason I despite the left is because of their hipocrisy, that they are just as corrupt and slimy - it's a bit rich the Guardian going on about this, when they are propped up by a fund in an offshore tax haven, and some promiment Labour types are busy troughing away and stashing goodies in "tax efficiency" schemes and locations.

    People do need to be able to work and create and enjoy the benefits of it; and they do need to be able to put something away; and they do need protecting from the tentacles of the state; but I don't see why that needs to be hidden.
    Norway is pretty close to the best country in the world, and doesn't need to do that. So, I don't know what the argument is, other than not liking people knowing all your business and forming judgements about you, and affecting your ability to mix with different kinds of people and cut favourable deals through info control.

    So why does anyone need "financial privacy"?

    ...answers on a postcard please.

  23. #73
    Thailand Expat OhOh's Avatar
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    ^How do you suggest hiding my hidden assets from my governments agents? If they are able to discover it's location, they are able to deny me of their use.

    Answers in two sentences.

  24. #74
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    Quote Originally Posted by OhOh View Post
    ^How do you suggest hiding my hidden assets from my governments agents? If they are able to discover it's location, they are able to deny me of their use.

    Answers in two sentences.
    Cash is king mate.

    Keep it under your mattress.

  25. #75
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    watching him greet his chosen supporters who all cheered and clapped

    Says don't blame the faceless ones or financiers over these papers,, Blame me.
    I should have handled it better.

    Yet no one blamed the faceless ones or financiers
    Knives were out for only Cameron and he tries shoving the blame elsewhere.
    And they ALL APPLAUDED their dear leader.

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