From multiple members of
Trump's cabinet to the British Royal Family, document dump of offshore dealings
shows how political leaders—joined by wealthy celebrities and the
ultra-rich—shelter their assets, keep shady relationships secret, and game the
tax systems of nations around the globe
Some of the world's
wealthiest and most powerful people will be waking up on Monday to discover
that some of their best kept secrets—how they hide their vast wealth and avoid
paying taxes—are now being read about in newspapers across the world after the
release of a trove of offshore legal and banking documents were leaked to
journalists and published Sunday as a joint project called the 'Paradise
Papers.'
"In all, the offshore
ties of more than a dozen Trump advisers, Cabinet members and major donors
appear in the leaked data.
First obtained by the German
newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung, the documents were then shared with scores
of journalists and researchers associated with the International
Consortium of Investigative Journalists and other media organizations,
including the New York Times, BBC, and the Guardian.
"There is this small
group of people who are not equally subject to the laws as the rest of us, and
that's on purpose," said author
and financial expert Brooke Harrington in response to the new insights about
how these elites secretly manage their wealth.
As the ICIJ reports,
the "trove of 13.4 million records exposes ties between Russia and U.S.
President Donald Trump's billionaire commerce secretary, the secret dealings of
the chief
fundraiser for Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau and the offshore
interests of the Queen of England and more than 120 politicians around the
world." According to the ICIJ, the documents show how deeply the
offshore financial system is entangled with the overlapping worlds of political
players, private wealth and corporate giants, including Apple, Nike, Uber and
other global companies that avoid taxes through increasingly imaginative
bookkeeping maneuvers.
One offshore web leads to
Trump’s commerce secretary, private equity tycoon Wilbur
Ross, who has a stake in a shipping companythat has received more than $68
million in revenue since 2014 from a Russian energy company co-owned by the
son-in-law of Russian President Vladimir Putin.
In all, the offshore ties of
more than a dozen Trump
advisers, Cabinet members and major donors appear in the leaked data.
At the center for the
leak, explains the Guardian,
is the law firm Appleby which has "outposts in Bermuda, the Cayman
Islands, the British Virgin Islands, the Isle of Man, Jersey and Guernsey. In
contrast to Mossack
Fonseca, the discredited firm at the centre of last year's Panama
Papers investigation, Appleby prides itself on being a leading member of
the 'magic circle' of top-ranking offshore service providers."
But what exactly do the
'Paradise Papers' represent? This video explains:
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