After reports Tuesday announced the reinstatement of Uruguay and also Costa Rica by the European Union to the “grey” list of tax havens, Montevideo was quick to reply all the EU had done was ratify “the status of Uruguay as a cooperating jurisdiction.”
Current Presidents Sebastián Piñera of Chile, Guillermo Lasso of Ecuador and Luis Abinader of the Dominican Republic were listed on the so-called “Pandora Papers” among the world leaders and celebrities who have money saved in tax havens, according to the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ).
EU finance ministers approved on Tuesday the addition of 10 more countries to the EU’s blacklist of tax havens, which currently includes only five jurisdictions and aims to help prevent tax fraud or evasion.
People using tax havens have deprived governments worldwide of £100 billion in revenue, enough to end extreme poverty twice over, according to new figures published by Oxfam. The total amount of lost tax revenue is far higher than £100 billion, as the figure only includes tax dodged by individuals, and not companies.