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Developing Nations, Advocacy Groups Call on U.N. to Better Fight Tax Evasion
By Colby Adams
printAdvocacy groups and developing countries are lobbying the United Nations to bolster its role in fighting tax crimes following disappointments with the efforts of an intergovernmental group representing wealthy nations. At least five nongovernmental organizations and six developing nations have petitioned the U.N.'s Economic and Social Affairs Committee to endow its Committee of Experts on International Cooperation in Tax Matters with the power to negotiate binding tax cooperation commitments. The groups are also asking that member-states allocate greater funding for the committee. The U.N. subsidiary organization, also known as the U.N. Tax Committee, includes 25 experts on international tax crimes,...
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Upcoming U.S. Treasury Department rules on a new law meant to curb tax evasion may mean only modest new compliance duties for American financial institutions, according to consultants.
An influential international anti-money laundering group may request that its members pass legislation tying tax evasion to money laundering as part of an effort to to pierce Swiss bank secrecy.
Many tax havens have done the bare minimum to remove themselves from an intergovernmental group's list of regulatory-lax jurisdictions, at times only signing tax treaties with other bank secrecy countries.
Information on tax evasion and asset recovery cases will likely top data-sharing requests filed by foreign governments with the United States over the next three to five years, say analysts.
Plans to make tax evasion a predicate crime of money laundering will likely be successful despite speculation that broader financial regulatory reform is foundering, say Capitol Hill staffers.
The head of the Senate's powerful Permanent Subcommittee on Investigations is pushing for the establishment of international agreements to penalize banks known to help tax evaders.
The Obama administration's plans to curb foreign institutions from aiding U.S. tax evaders is short on details, but could block U.S. citizens and residents' access to foreign banks and put a new compliance burden on U.S. institutions, say some tax professionals.
An increase in the number of individuals coming clean about secreting away money will mean greater government scrutiny of foreign bank accounts and complicit financial institutions, say tax attorneys.