Offshore News Digest for Week of November 12, 2001

SWISS ECONOMIC POLICIES QUESTIONED

Ron HOLLAND marshals history and facts, asking: "Has Switzerland Sold Out to Washington, London & Wall Street?"

The Swiss freeze bank accounts of Pakistan ex-president BHUTTO.

NEW CANADA LAW BLASTED

An attorney says Canada's new anti-dirty cash law wont catch terrorists, but will boost taxes, costs and hurt civil liberties.

NON-HAVEN CYPRUS DOUBLES I.B.C. TAXES

NICOSIA. Ending its role as a tax haven, Cyprus more than doubles its tax on offshore corporations, just to please the EU.

MAN BITES TABLOIDS

Officials of the ISLE of MAN want an end to unfounded "tax haven bashing" by the sensationalist British press.

TAX HAVEN ICELAND?

REYKJAVIK, Iceland. This northern most nation lays official plans to become a world class offshore tax haven.

BILLIONS IN SPANISH INVESTMENTS GONE

MADRID. 16.7 billion pesetas ($US90 million) missing from the Spanish investment firm Gescartera, hidden in an unknown tax haven.

BARBADOS LAWYERS WARNED

BRIDGETOWN, Barbados. The attorney general of this free enterprise Caribbean nation says lawyers must expose dirty cash, or else.

HONG KONG CLAIMS LEADERSHIP STATUS

This special area of Communist CHINA says the stats show HONG KONG is still a leader offshore center for the Asian economic area.

NICARAGUA CHOOSES FREEDOM

MANAGUA, Nicaragua. Leftist Sandinista ex-president, Daniel Ortega, is easily defeated for president by conservative VP Enrique Bolanos.

C.F.P. FIGHTS IRS REGULATIONS

WASHINGTON. The Center for Freedom and Prosperity continues its campaign against IRS plans to help foreign governments tax income earned in the US by non-resident aliens.

OFFSHORE SAVINGS FOR BRIT RETIREES

LONDON. We say it again; for retired Brits who want to save lot of taxes, the place to go is way offshore.

DUMB TAX IDEA DIES HARD

Just what a worldwide recession needs to make it a depression; a tax on each and every international capital transfer.

COMING ANARCHY? RICH VS. POOR

A new book claims "the end of the cold war merely set the parameters for the next struggle for survival".

HOW DO ISLAMIC “HAWALAS” OPERATE?

Exactly what goes on in the money transfer systems subjected to US police raids?. A graphic & article that explains.

NEW U.S. ANTI-TERROR LAW

Two views of what that new USA PATRIOT law means,

U.S. VIOLATES RIGHT TO ATTORNEY-CLIENT PRIVILEGE

On an “emergency” basis, the US government will listen in on all talk between detained federal suspects and their lawyers.

BUSH OPPOSES I.D. CARDS?

Small comfort! A top administration official denies any plans for a US national identification card.

E.U. WANTS MORE SNOOP POWERS

The European Union wants power for secret surveillance of e-mails, Internet and phone usage without a warrant.

SO DO BRITISH TAX COLLECTORS

Sweeping UK proposals for police access to user records of every British telephone and Internet user will apply to minor crimes and tax collection, not just anti-terrorist investigations.

CAMPIONE UNFLUSTERED BY SCANDAL

Every few years, scandal descends on Campione d'Italia. The latest terror inquiry may be its most clamorous case.

But the Campione case shows why tracing alleged terror cash verges on the impossible, in Switzerland or elsewhere.

For more information about Campione d'Italia see,

GIBRALTAR CHIEF WILL BOYCOTT

Peter Caruana, Chief Minister, will boycott British-Spanish talks on Nov. 20th in Brussels. He wont be party to a UK sellout of his colony.

IGNORING E.U., IRELAND PROSPERS

The Irish economy is the best in Europe because they refused to kowtow to EU orders, says Prime Minister Bertie Ahern.

BRAVE BAHAMAS

NASSAU. The government crows about turning over records of a dormant Muslim bank to the US anti-terror police.

U.S. LIKES SOME TERRORISTS MORE THAN OTHERS

Lebanese bankers say the US is unlikely to press its request for the freezing of assets held by Hizbollah, the Shia Muslim group.

U.K. SUPER AGENCY CLAMPS DOWN ON FINANCE

LONDON. N2 is about to strike every UK financial business. What's N2? Consolidated regulatory regimes for banking, insurance and investments with a 12-volume rule book.

WHY MUSLIM FINANCE TAKES A BACK SEAT

Traditional Muslim law has curbed business and financial development.

JAPANESE BANKS TOTTER ON THE BRINK

TOKYO. The question is, when will they fall?

SOFTWARE WONT SPOT TERROR CASH

The makers of anti-money laundering software used in 75 major banks admit their programs cannot find terrorist cash.

I.M.F. MULLS ANTI-TERROR ROLE

US pressure to act on terrorist financing has the International Monetary Fund puzzled as to how it should respond.

ISRAEL DIRTY CASH AGENCY PROBLEMS

JERUSALEM. Head of the anti-money laundering agency quits.

UNITED KINGDOM, HOME OF DIRTY CASH

LONDON. At last the sanctimonious UK begins to admit it may be the money laundering capital of the world.

BRITISH LABOUR CREATES POLICE STATE

LONDON. Tony Blair declares a “public emergency”, suspends human rights, will hold suspects indefinitely without charges. Minister says concerns about liberty are "airy, fairy."

CANADIAN LAWYERS CHALLENGE “HITLER LAW”

VANCOUVER. Canada's 81,000 lawyers should not be government informers, so leading attorneys sue to block a law that does just that.

U.S. SNOOPS WANT HIGH TECH SPYING

WASHINGTON. A government wish list of techno-goodies to spy on you.

WORLD CRIMINAL COURT NIXED

US Congress prohibits cooperation in the establishment of the International Criminal Court.

“Reasonable Doubt: The Case Against the Proposed International Criminal Court,”

SWITZERLAND IN THE NEWS

Swiss police officials says they were rushed into acting against alleged terrorist groups before they were ready.

The head of the Swiss Bankers Assoc. says naming and shaming bankers who violate money laundering laws is the new rule.

And here is one of those shameful Swiss bankers.

SWISS FREEZER BURN

CULLY, Switzerland. Freezing assets here is easy. Thawing out assets is an entirely different story.

U.S. LUXEMBOURG TAX TREATY

The two nations agree on rules for combating tax evasion and double taxation.

LEICHTENSTEIN SQUEAKY CLEAN

This once secretive principality wants to world to know it is now clean.

JERSEY CLEANS UP

This once suspect Channel Island has also cleaned up its image, says TIME Magazine.

FREE OR NOT FREE?

HONG KONG is found to be the freest economy in the world for the 8th straight year.

But HK also boosts its power to seize cash and assets.

SUPER POWER E.U.

The head of the EU wants it to be a super power, but not everyone agrees.

And the EU wants total eavesdropping power over the Internet.

ACCUSED BARAKAT BANK DENIES TERROR TIES

LONDON. The chairman of a financial organization accused of funding Osama bin Laden's terrorist network denies the allegations.

ISLAMIC BANKERS CLAIM CLEANLINESS

Muslim bankers say they are less likely than their western counterparts to allow money laundering and tax evasion.

But INDIA’s largest, the Bombay-based State Bank of India, is fined $7.5 million by the US government for money laundering.

FRENCH INSURERS SUSPECT

PARIS. French insurance companies are accused of being lax on dirty cash.

GERMAN FINANCIAL CRIMES SOAR

There's been a huge increase in suspected money laundering and tax evasion cases reported since the Sept. 11th terrorist attacks.

GOLD IN THE NEWS

Sales of gold as an investment soared 400% after the Sept. 11 terrorist attacks.

And a multi-billion dollar merger is about to create the world's number one gold mining company.

TERRORIST DEFINITION EXPANDS

New US anti-terrorist laws can be used for routine criminal investigations unrelated to terrorism.

CONGRESS IGNORED

The Bush administration ignores lawmakers as it makes its own laws.

MILITARY TAKES OVER COURTS

Bush orders military tribunals to replace US courts.

1 800 + REPORT A TERRORIST

150,000 people have phoned in terrorist tips to the FBI.

BLAIR THE ARROGANT CONTROL FREAK

LONDON. Labour's darling is turning the UK into a police state.

And Amnesty International denounces UK threats to freedom.