From Prof. Thomas Pogge: "Intense negotiations are going on at the United Nations about the formulation of the new sustainable development goals (SDGs) and the targets and indicators to be used for specification and measurement. Starting 11 September, the president of the general assembly will host … [Read more...]
Human Rights
Secret tax report on Glencore withheld by EIB – why?
From Christian Aid, a press release aimed concerning possible tax evasion in Zambia, and aimed at UK Chancellor George Osborne: Christian Aid urges George Osborne to intervene on secret bank tax report Christian Aid is appealing to George Osborne to help secure the release of a report by the … [Read more...]
Taxing Men and Women: new report on gender and tax justice
Hot on the heels of our announcment earlier this week of the launch of Women for Tax Justice, Christian Aid have now published a report titled Taxing Men and Women: why gender is crucial for a fair tax system. … [Read more...]
Honest Accounts? The true story of Africa’s billion dollar losses
For decades Western countries have peddled a fairy tale about Africa's plight. The tale spins a homely story of how the West provides development aid to assist African nations overcome their own shortcomings. The tale is, of course, a vicious and mendacious nonsense. As this new report from … [Read more...]
Quote of the day: big accountancy firms have a human rights problem
From Prem Sikka our quote of the day comes from an article entitled Big accountancy firms have a human rights problem: "In many other organisations such subversion of the human rights would be considered to be a badge of shame. At major accountancy firms it is increasingly considered to be a sign … [Read more...]
The Offshore Wrapper: a week in tax justice
Updated with a clarification of Prince Charles' tax affairs. The Offshore Wrapper is written by George Turner Democracy is bad for you In move that can only be described as nuts, the big four accountancy firms, PWC, Deloitte, Ernst and Young and KPMG have clubbed together to take out a … [Read more...]
The Swiss commodity black hole: a bizarre new government proposal
From the Berne Declaration and Swissaid: "The Federal Council today announced its wish to close the Swiss gaps in transparency for the global commodity industry. But the entire commodities trading business may well be excluded from any future regulation." … [Read more...]
The Impacts of Illicit Financial Flows on Peace and Security in Africa
From Alex Cobham of the Center for Global Development, a paper for the Tana High-Level Forum on Security in Africa 2014. It's called, as our title suggests, The Impacts of Illicit Financial Flows on Peace and Security in Africa. Published in April, it's an important contribution to the … [Read more...]
New report: developing countries want automatic information exchange
From the International Tax Review: "The Tax Justice Network (TJN) has accused the OECD of not consulting developing countries about the design of the framework for Automatic Information Exchange (AIE), which the G20 has endorsed as the global model for information exchange." Our new report was … [Read more...]
Linking Finance to Human Rights: the video
From Center of Concern, a video that fits well with our tax justice and human rights programme. As they note: "Only through financial reform can human rights be sustained. The Center of Concern provides this video for your use in classes, meetings, and other community organizing … [Read more...]
Tax, corporate responsibility and human rights: new paper
From the Boston University Law Review, a paper by Jasmine Fisher entitled Fairer Shores: tax havens, tax avoidance and corporate social responsibility. Its introduction contains this: "The doctrine of corporate social responsibility provides a logical rationale for multinational corporations to … [Read more...]
Tax Justice Focus – the Human Rights edition
The latest edition of our newsletter Tax Justice Focus focuses on the theme of tax justice and human rights, perhaps the fastest-growing area of interest in the rapidly expanding global tax justice community. Click here for the full edition of Tax Justice Focus, the Human Rights edition. You … [Read more...]
Brazilians will pay heavily for FIFA’s “obscene” tax abuses
Four years ago we wrote about FIFA's so-called African "tax bubble" where FIFA was forcing a poor African country to forego its potential football tax revenues in order to funnel yet more money into FIFA's gilded Zürich headquarters and its lucrative empire. We quoted Professor Han Kogels of … [Read more...]
On the non-perils of information exchange
Update: see TJN writer Nicholas Shaxson's Five Myths about Tax Havens, in the Washington Post, April 2016. Back in 2009 we wrote a long blog looking at tax havens' arguments that if they give up information to countries with poor governance, all sorts of disasters will ensue. We think it's … [Read more...]
Illicit financial flows and human rights: attention grows with new report
We've just written about an important report by the CESR and Christian Aid on fiscal justice and human rights, as more evidence that the world is waking up to the crucial linkages between human rights and tax and offshore abuses. Now here's another report, a policy brief from the Hague Institute … [Read more...]
