Spanish king distances himself from scandal-hit father

Yahoo – AFP, March 15, 2020

Juan Carlos handed over power to his son, Felipe in 2014 (AFP Photo/Juanjo Martín)

Madrid (AFP) - King Felipe VI of Spain moved Sunday to distance himself from his scandal-hit father, stripping him of his palace allowance and renouncing what he was due to inherit from him.

A statement from the palace announced that he had stripped the former king Juan Carlos, of his allowance and was himself renouncing what he was due to inherit from him.

The announcement came after media reports that Juan Carlos had received 100 million dollars (90 million euros) from Saudi Arabia via an offshore account -- and that King Felipe himself was also a beneficiary.

The money was lodged in a Swiss bank account in the name of a Panamanian foundation.

In the palace statement, the reigning king said that in April he had made it clear to a notary that he would accept no money from the foundation in question.

He also that he had absolutely no knowledge of having been named as a beneficiary to another foundation, which according to press reports paid millions of euros towards his father's flights in private jets.

On Tuesday, the Spanish parliament decided against launching an investigation into suspected money laundering by the former king Juan Carlos.

Reported Saudi payments to ex-king

Spain's hard-left Podemos party had called for it after reports earlier this month that in 2008 Juan Carlos received $100 million from Saudi king Abdallah via the Swiss account of an entity listed in Panama.

The Swiss daily Tribune de Geneve added that in 2012, $65 million of that sum was given by the king to his former mistress, Corinna zu Sayn-Wittgenstein.

Then a report in Britain's Daily Telegraph said that 52-year-old King Felipe was also a beneficiary of the fund, which it said had been set up when Juan Carlos was still on the throne.

Juan Carlos, now 82, came to the throne after the death of the military dictator Francisco Franco in 1975 and is widely respected for having favoured a transition to democracy.

But he lost his immunity from prosecution after handing power to his son, Felipe, in June 2014 following a 39-year reign.

He resigned from public life last year after a series of scandals about his private life.

In 2012, he outraged Spaniards by going elephant hunting in Botswana at the height of the country's recession.

Spanish reports say Juan Carlos has until now received an annual allowance from the state of more than 194,000 euros.

Google to stop using ‘double Irish, Dutch sandwich’ tax dodge: Reuters

DutchNews, January 2, 2020

Photo: Depositphotos.com

Google parent Alphabet is to stop using an intellectual property licensing loophole, known as the ‘Double Irish, Dutch sandwich’, which allowed it to cut its global tax bill, Reuters reports. 

The strategy involves companies moving money from an Irish subsidiary to a Dutch holding company and then back to an Irish holding company located in Bermuda with licensing rights to Google intellectual property. 

Because Bermuda has no corporate income tax it was lucrative for Google to report income there, effectively delaying tax payment on international earnings to the US for years while paying a lower tax rate in Europe. 

After pressure from the EU and the US Ireland closed the loopholes in 2014 and companies were given until 2020 to comply with new tax regulations. 

Dutch filings at the Chamber of Commerce and seen by Reuters showed that in 2018 Google moved €21.8bn through its Dutch holding company to Bermuda, up from €19.9bn in 2017. 

Reuters said the filing did not give a definite end date but that Google management expected the termination to take place ‘as of 31 December 2019 or during 2020′. 

The scheme was in place for over a decade and allowed the tech giant to cut its tax bill by hundreds of billions of euros, the Guardian estimates. 

The Netherlands does not currently tax royalties, but is planning to change this as part of a package of measures to crack down on tax evasion in 2021. 

Some 10,000 shell, or letter-box, companies are based in the Netherlands and are primarily used to shift corporate earnings and obscure ownership. Google has used its Dutch affiliate to move money since 2004.

EU loses big Starbucks tax case, wins on Fiat

Yahoo – AFP, Catherine KURZAWA, September 24, 2019

In cases keenly being watched by Apple, ordered to repay Ireland 13 billion euros 
in 2016, Brussels saw its unpaid taxes claim against Starbucks annulled -- but 
upheld in the case of Fiat (AFP Photo/Kenzo TRIBOUILLARD)

Luxembourg (AFP) - An EU court on Tuesday annulled an order by Brussels that Starbucks pay 30 million euros to the Netherlands, saying regulators had failed to demonstrate it received illegal state aid.

In a separate decision, however, the same court said Fiat must pay roughly the same amount to Luxembourg, upholding a similar EU order from 2015.

The split decision will be closely watched by Apple, which was ordered to repay Ireland 13 billion euros in 2016 in a blockbuster case that is also making its way through EU courts.

The cases can now be appealed at the EU's highest court, the European Court of Justice.

"The general court annuls the commission's decision on the aid measure implemented by the Netherlands in favour of Starbucks," the statement said.

"The commission was unable to demonstrate the existence of an advantage in favour of Starbucks," it added.

The cases from 2015 were the first out of the gate in the crackdown by the EU's anti-trust supremo Margarethe Vestager against member states that had sealed sweetheart tax deals with multinationals.

In her landmark rulings, Vestager said Dutch authorities must recoup unpaid taxes from Starbucks because it illegally allowed an elaborate tax set-up that allowed it to shift revenue abroad.

"I am pleased that the European Commission's case on Starbucks against the Netherlands on state aid has been clarified," Dutch secretary of state for finance Menno Snel said in a statement.

"This decision proves that the Dutch tax authorities treated Starbucks like any other company, and no better or different," he added.

The Starbucks and Fiat cases are dwarfed by the blockbuster order in 2016 that Apple repay Ireland 13 billion euros.

That case drew global attention, helping Vestager become the EU's highest-profile official.

In the new commission, she has been promoted to executive vice president and will effectively become Europe's tech regulation czar, while still holding on to her powerful anti-trust portfolio.

EU member states such as Belgium, Ireland, Luxembourg and the Netherlands have attracted multinationals over many years by offering extremely favourable tax deals to generate jobs and investment.

The issue hit close to home in 2014 with the LuxLeaks scandal which revealed that European Commission President Jean-Claude Juncker's native Luxembourg gave companies favourable tax deals while he was prime minister.

Luxembourg has also been ordered by Brussels to recoup 250 million euros from Amazon and 120 million euros from French energy giant Engie.

The same court handed the commission a first setback in 2019, when it threw out a tax deal decision against Belgium, but mainly on procedural grounds. The commission last week refiled the case.

The commission is also investigating tax deals with Ikea and Nike in the Netherlands. Brussels dropped a keenly-watched case against McDonald's.

Apple slams EU as epic court battle over tax bill begins

Yahoo – AFP, Catherine KURZAWA, 17 September 2019

The EU has taken a 13-billion-euro bite out of Apple

Apple went on the offensive against Brussels in an EU court on Tuesday, fighting the European Commission's landmark order that the iPhone-maker reimburse Ireland 13 billion euros ($14 billion) in back taxes.

The EU's tax demand, made three years ago, "defies reality and common sense," Apple's lawyer Daniel Beard told the EU's lower General Court.

The commission's "conclusion... is wrong," he added at the start of two days of hearings.

Lawyers for the world's biggest company faced EU officials in the Luxembourg court, challenging a decision that CEO Tim Cook slammed at the time as "total political crap" with no basis in law.

Ireland, which is similarly appealing the decision, lashed out at the EU's "astonishing" interpretation of tax law.

"The Commission decision simply ignores Irish laws," Ireland's representative Maurice Collins told judges.

The commission's historic decision was delivered in August 2016 by Competition Commissioner Margrethe Vestager, a shock decision that put Europe at the forefront of an emerging effort to rein in the power of America's largest technological companies.

The EU accuses Apple of parking untaxed revenue earned in Europe, Africa, the Middle East and India in Ireland, which has become a European hub for US-based big tech.

This privilege allegedly gave Apple an advantage over other companies, allowing it to avoid Irish taxes between 2003 and 2014 of around 13 billion euros which, according to Brussels, constituted illegal "state aid" by Ireland.

An EU lawyer pushed back at Apple and Ireland's arguments, insisting that the iPhone-maker was on the hook to pay taxes in Ireland.

The judges are not expected to hand down their decision before 2020. Any appeal would then go the EU's highest court, the European Court of Justice, for a final ruling that could land as late as 2021.

Apple CEO Tim Cook, in charge of the world's biggest company, has called the 

EU tax case "total political crap"

'Rewrite history'

Apple fiercely rejects the tax bill, while the US government insists the order by Brussels constitutes a major breach of international tax law.

"The European Commission has tried to rewrite Apple's history in Europe, to ignore Ireland's tax laws and, in doing so, to disrupt the international tax system," Tim Cook said in an open letter in 2016.

The group insists that it is in the United States, where the company invests in research and development and thus creates wealth, that it must pay taxes on the revenue in question.

This became possible after a major tax overhaul in the US at the end of 2017 that allowed Apple to repatriate profits made abroad. Apple has promised to pay Washington a tax bill of $37 billion, in addition to the taxes already paid in the United States.

That argument is "perfectly irrelevant", said the commission's lawyer.

"There is no tax mismatch here," said the lawyer.

The two days of hearings are taking place in a tense trade context between the EU and the United States. President Donald Trump accuses Europeans of deliberately attacking American technology giants.

The EU's competition supremo, Vestager, has in particular been accused by Trump of "hating" the US. He has slammed her as the "tax lady" because of the investigations and heavy fines imposed on US tech firms such as Google.

Pending the conclusion of the case, Apple has blocked the funds in an escrow account: a total of 14.3 billion euros after interest.

The group, which has been present in Ireland since the 1980s, employs around 6,000 people in Cork, the country's second-largest city.

The first indications of how the Apple case may finish will come as early as September 24 when the same EU court will rule on whether Vestager was right to demand unpaid taxes from Starbucks and a unit of Fiat Chrysler.

Germany and the Netherlands meet to discuss climate change plans

DutchNews, August 16, 2019

 Photo: DutchNews.nl 

The Netherlands and Germany will hold a joint summit next week to discuss how to dovetail their plans to combat climate change, the Financieele Dagblad said on Friday. 

Prime minister Mark Rutte and German chancellor Angela Merkel will meet in The Hague on Thursday with other government ministers to talk about working more closely together, the paper said. 

The meeting is a preparatory one, and further, more detailed, talks will take place in October. The agenda for next week includes the introduction of a carbon tax on industry and plans to store carbon dioxide underground. 

Jan Braun of The Hague’s Centre for Strategic Studies told the paper that if the Netherlands and Germany can take the same approach they will be able to act as a role model for other EU countries. In addition, their alliance will boost the likelihood of a Europe-wide carbon tax being introduced, he said.

Swiss vote to tighten gun laws, safeguard EU relations

Yahoo – AFP, Nina LARSON, May 19, 2019

Final results showed that Swiss voters overwhelmingly supported reforming their gun
laws, with 63.7 percent casting their ballot in favour (AFP Photo/STEFAN WERMUTH)

Geneva (AFP) - The Swiss voted Sunday to toughen their gun laws and bring them in line with EU legislation, heeding warnings that rejecting the change could have threatened relations with the bloc.

Final results showed that voters overwhelmingly supported reforming Swiss gun laws, with a full 63.7 percent casting their ballot in favour.

A majority of voters in all but one of Switzerland's 26 cantons backed the reform, with the Italian-speaking canton of Ticino in southern Switzerland the only outlier.

A demand from the neighbouring European Union that the Swiss toughen their gun laws prompted a rare national debate over firearm ownership in the wealthy Alpine nation, which has a deeply-rooted gun culture.

While the government cautioned that the new legislation was crucial to the non-EU country maintaining its treaties with the bloc, the proposal sparked a fierce pushback from the gun lobby and shooting enthusiasts, who gathered enough signatures to trigger a vote under Switzerland's famous direct democratic system.

Brussels changed its own weapons laws two years ago following a wave of deadly terrorist attacks across Europe, slapping bans on certain types of semi-automatic firearms.

While not an EU member, Switzerland is bound to the bloc through an array of intricately connected bilateral agreements.

Bern had cautioned that a "No" vote would lead to Switzerland's exclusion from the visa-free Schengen travel region and also the Dublin accords regulating Europe's asylum-seeking process.

Shooting enthusiasts have gathered enough support to trigger a vote on
new gun laws under Switzerland's famous direct democratic system
(AFP Photo/Fabrice COFFRINI)

This would have far-reaching consequences for security, asylum and even tourism, and would cost the country "several billion Swiss francs each year," it said.

Liberties 'eroded'

The shooting enthusiasts behind Sunday's referendum had insisted the government warnings were "exaggerated".

The campaign charged that law change amounts to an "EU dictate" that reins in Swiss sovereignty and would "erase the right to own weapons" in Switzerland.

The ProTell gun lobby voiced concern at the consequences of Sunday's referendum, in which some 43 percent of eligible voters participated.

"Today, our liberties have been eroded," ProTell President Jean-Luc Addor told RTS, also insisting that the reform would "obviously not avoid a single terrorist attack".

The populist, rightwing Swiss People's Party (SVP) -- the only party to oppose the reform -- meanwhile cautioned that bowing to an "EU dictate" would have consequences.

"We acknowledge that there is a certain need to remain within Schengen and Dublin, but we cannot accept just anything to do so," SVP vice president Celine Amaudru told the ATS news agency, cautioning that the EU going forward "will be able to dictate what it wants" by playing to Swiss fears of being left out.

It is difficult to know exactly how many firearms are in circulation in Switzerland, since guns are registered regionally and there is no national registry.

The strong gun culture in Switzerland is partially tied to its tradition of national defence 

service, as most Swiss men undergo obligatory military service (AFP Photo/STEFAN 

WERMUTH)

'Exceptional authorisation'

But according to a 2017 report by the Small Arms Survey, the country boasts the world's 16th highest rate of gun ownership, with some 2.3 million firearms in civilian hands -- nearly three for every 10 inhabitants.

The strong gun culture in Switzerland is partially tied to its tradition of national defence service, as most Swiss men undergo obligatory military service between the ages of 18 and 30. They are allowed to keep their assigned weapon when they are done.

Under the new gun law, which has already been approved by legislators, semi-automatic weapons with high-capacity magazines will be listed as "banned".

Collectors and sports shooters could still purchase such weapons, but would need to jump through more hoops to obtain an "exceptional authorisation".

Another issue put to a national referendum Sunday -- a government proposal to overhaul the country's corporate tax system and pump more cash into its pension system -- also won overwhelming support.

A full 66.4 percent of voters, and all 26 cantons, supported that reform, according to the final results.

The Netherlands is a tax haven alongside Ireland, Malta and Cyprus, say MEPs

DutchNews, March 27, 2019

Photo: Joep Poulssen

Members of the European parliament have voted to include the Netherlands, Ireland, Luxembourg, Malta and Cyprus on the official EU tax haven black list. 

However the motion, proposed by Dutch Labour MEP Paul Tang, will not have any affect on the listing because members states have to unanimously approve every inclusion, the Financieele Dagblad said on Wednesday. 

The official EU blacklist of places considered to facilitate tax evasion now comprises 15 countries, after 10, including Aruba, were added earlier this month. However, Tang said this did not go far enough, and referred to research last year by the European Commission which said the Netherlands cooperated with ‘aggressive tax planning’. 

Tang’s motion was passed by 408 to 205. 

Dutch junior finance minister Menno Snel said in a reaction that he was astonished by the vote. ‘The Netherlands has a leading position in the battle against international tax evasion,’ he told the FD.

EU expands tax blacklist to 15 countries, including UAE

Yahoo – AFP, March 12, 2019

The "naming and shaming" of countries into better tax policies comes only days
after a money-laundering blacklist by the EU was torpedoed by the bloc's own
member governments, after a draft included Saudi Arabia (AFP Photo/Emmanuel
DUNAND)

Brussels (AFP) - The European Union expanded its tax haven blacklist to 15 countries on Tuesday, adding the United Arab Emirates and Bermuda over the objections of powerful member states such as Italy.

The list was first drawn up in 2017 in the wake of several scandals, including the Panama Papers and LuxLeaks, that pushed the EU into doing more to fight tax evasion by multinationals and the rich.

Seven countries are to be moved back from a grey list because reform commitments had not been met. These are Aruba, Belize, Bermuda, Fiji, Oman, Vanuatu and Dominica, an EU statement said.

They are joined by three other countries whose tax policies have grown more aggressive in the past months. They are Barbados, the United Arab Emirates and the Marshall Islands.

Italy long resisted the addition of the UAE. The Middle East powerhouse has recently made significant investments in the economically troubled European country.

Rome had wanted to keep the Emirates on the so-called grey list of countries that have made pledges to get their tax laws in order with a standard set by Brussels.

"Everything will be solved" when new legislation in passed in the UAE, Italian Finance Minister Giovanni Tria said. "The Emirates will come out immediately afterwards."

Britain, just weeks before its planned divorce from the EU on March 29, resisted the addition of its overseas territory Bermuda but relented last week.

Five countries remain blacklisted because they did nothing to justify moving them off the original list of tax havens: American Samoa, Guam, Samoa, Trinidad and Tobago, and the US Virgin Islands

This "naming and shaming" of countries into better tax policies comes only days after a money-laundering blacklist by the EU was torpedoed by the bloc's own member governments, after a draft included Saudi Arabia.

Romanian Finance Minister Eugen Teodorovici, whose country holds the EU's six-month rotating presidency, earlier told reporters that last minute promises by countries to fix their tax policies would delay the list until May.

However French counterpart Bruno Le Maire, France’s finance minister said he wanted no delays.

"France wants the list to be adopted today," he said.

'Nearly a third' of British billionaires moved to tax havens

Yahoo – AFP, Dmitry ZAKS, March 7, 2019

It is reported that 10 British billionaires and 408 UK business owners live in
Monaco, according to The Sunday Times (AFP Photo/VALERY HACHE)

London (AFP) - Nearly a third of Britain's billionaires have either moved or are relocating to tax havens, where some have broken UK law by bankrolling political parties, a major investigation said on Thursday.

The Times newspaper published a series of reports detailing allegations of Britain's ultra-rich hiding billions of pounds from the UK Treasury in taxes over the past decade.

The report came out days after the government drew public fury for delaying a vote on proposed legislation aimed at ending secret company ownership in offshore territories.

"We must stop tax evasion so that the wealthiest pay their fair share," Margaret Hodge, a leading lawmaker from the main opposition Labour Party who co-sponsored the tax haven measure, tweeted in response to The Times reports.

"Public registers and more transparency are the next big step for fairer tax."

Prime Minister Theresa May's government did not immediately respond to the investigation.

Knights and dames

The Times said that 28 out of the 93 British billionaires it found through public records "have moved to tax havens or are in the process of relocating".

It said almost half of the 28 have left in the past decade.

The Times said those in the process of moving included Jim Ratcliffe, Britain's richest man and a major Brexit supporter. His chemicals firm is valued at £35 billion ($46 billion).

The Times said those in the process of moving included Jim Ratcliffe, Britain's
richest man and a major Brexit supporter (AFP Photo/JUSTIN TALLIS)

The Sunday Times reported last month that Ratcliffe's move to Monaco, where it said 10 British billionaires and 408 UK business owners live, could cost the Treasury up to £4 billion.

Asked about his rumoured move last October, Ratcliffe told Britain's Press Association news agency that he was staying in Britain.

The Times said big business owners were trying to avoid paying Britain's relatively high 38.1 percent income tax on dividends -- the cash payments made by corporations to their shareholders.

It is effectively a profit tax, since business owners hold a large portion of their company's shares.

Tax-evading

Companies registered in offshore tax shelters such as the Channel Islands or countries like Switzerland and the United Arab Emirates pay little to no tax.

The Times said the exodus was spurred by a hike in income tax rates for top earners to 50 percent in 2010, which was reduced to 45 percent in 2013.

New rules from 2013 making a switch in tax residency easier also contributed, The Times said.

But some of its most damning allegations concerned political contributions.

The Times said successive UK governments have failed to properly enact a 2009 law banning large donations from anyone residing abroad for tax purposes.

It said tax-evading business owners and their companies have made political contributions worth £5.5 million over the past decade.

Prime Minister Theresa May's Conservatives accepted £1 million from these entities in the months leading up to the 2017 snap general election, The Times said.

It added that several of these billionaires have also received honorary titles such as baron, knight and dame.

Ronaldo avoids jail but hit by hefty fine for tax fraud in Spain

Yahoo – AFP, Diego URDANETA, Jan 22, 2019

Cristiano Ronaldo arrived at the court in Madrid with girlfriend Georgina
Rodriguez (AFP Photo/PIERRE-PHILIPPE MARCOU)

Madrid (AFP) - Juventus star Cristiano Ronaldo avoided jail on Tuesday but was ordered by a Spanish court to pay 3.57 million euros ($4.1 million) for committing tax fraud when at Real Madrid, part of a broader 18.8-million-euro payout.

Sporting sunglasses and a smile, accompanied by his girlfriend Georgina Rodriguez, Ronaldo arrived at the court in northeastern Madrid for a brief hearing.

He was handed a two-year jail sentence immediately reduced to a fine of 365,000 euros and another penalty of 3.2 million euros, according to the sentence.

Accused of having avoided paying 5.7 million euros in taxes due on his image rights between 2011 and 2014, Ronaldo has already paid the taxman 6.7 million euros for what he owed plus interest, the sentence read.

That -- plus the court fine -- comes to more than 10 million euros.

In June, the player's lawyers and Spain's taxman came to an agreement that Ronaldo would pay a grand total of 18.8 million euros.

Ronaldo grinned and signed autographs outside the court (AFP Photo/

OSCAR DEL POZO)

That amount was not mentioned in the sentence but a source at the court, who refused to be named, said Ronaldo would have to pay 18.8 million euros in total, giving no further details.

Contacted by AFP, tax authorities, prosecutors and lawyers representing Ronaldo refused to provide any information.

It is unclear whether the remaining amount is a separate administrative fine.

'Very well'

"I am very well," the five-time Ballon d'Or winner told the crowd of reporters gathered outside of the court as he left the hearing. He signed a few autographs before leaving in a black van.

The court refused the player's request to appear by video or to enter the building by car to avoid the spotlight.

Ronaldo, who last year joined Italian champions Juventus, smiled broadly as he arrived at the court dressed in black trousers, a black turtleneck and dark sunglasses, holding hands with Rodriguez.

Ronaldo's tax troubles come from his time at Real Madrid, where he won two 

league titles and four Champions Leagues (AFP Photo/GABRIEL BOUYS)

Police officers escorted him.

He had played for Juventus on Monday night, missing a penalty as the Italian league leaders eased past bottom club Chievo 3-0.

Offshore companies

Madrid prosecutors opened an investigation into Ronaldo in June 2017 and he was questioned in July that same year.

"I have never hidden anything, nor have I had the intention of evading taxes," he told the court then, according to a statement from the sports agency which represents him, Gestifute.

Prosecutors accused Ronaldo of having used companies in low-tax foreign jurisdictions -- notably the British Virgin Islands and Ireland -- to avoid paying the tax due in Spain on payments for his image rights between 2011 and 2014.

Ronaldo's former Real Madrid teammate Xabi Alonso 

was also in court in Madrid on tax evasion charges

(AFP Photo/PIERRE-PHILIPPE MARCOU)

His lawyers argued there had been a difference in interpretation of what was and was not taxable in Spain, and deny any deliberate attempt to evade tax.

But under the deal between Spain's tax authorities and his lawyers, Ronaldo pleaded guilty to four counts of tax fraud.

Ronaldo is one of several footballers to have fallen foul of Spain's tax authorities in recent years.

Barcelona's Lionel Messi, once Ronaldo's big La Liga rival, paid a two-million-euro fine in 2016 in his own tax wrangle and received a 21-month jail term.

The prison sentence was later reduced to a further fine of 252,000 euros, equivalent to 400 euros per day of the original term.

Alonso faces trial

Ronaldo's former Real Madrid team-mate Xabi Alonso appeared at the same Madrid court on Tuesday, for the first time, on a separate tax evasion charge.

Public prosecutors are seeking a five-year jail sentence and a fine of four million euros.

The trial was suspended while the court considers whether it has jurisdiction to hear the case.

Ronaldo and Rodriguez left court after the star was sentenced. (AFP Photo/

OSCAR DEL POZO)

"I never hid anything, I have to defend myself," Alonso, 37, told reporters as he left the court.

Ronaldo is also facing accusations in the United States where a former American model accused him of raping her in Las Vegas in 2009.

Police in the US city recently asked Italian authorities for a DNA sample from the footballer.

Ronaldo has always denied the accusations.

In a New Year's Eve interview with Portuguese sports daily Record, he said he had a "calm conscience" and was "confident that everything will very soon be clarified".

Related Article:

Cristiano Ronaldo denies tax fraud at court hearing

Shell facing €7bn bill for ‘anti-competitive’ tax avoidance deal

DutchNews, June 18, 2018

Photo: Depositphotos.com 

Oil giant Shell faces having to pay €7 billion in backdated taxes after an MEP said he would ask the European Commission to investigate its deal with the Dutch authorities. 

Paul Tang, leader of the Labour party’s (PvdA) group in the European Parliament, claimed the agreement was a clear breach of European rules on state aid for private companies. 

The deal dates back to 2005, when Shell, previously an Anglo-Dutch concern, merged its two branches to establish a single headquarters in The Hague. The Dutch tax office allowed the company to exempt its UK-based shareholders from paying dividend tax by routing payments through an offshore trust in Jersey. 

Tang said the tax service’s decision to approve the construction was similar to other officially sanctioned tax avoidance schemes, such as Apple’s deal with Ireland. 

‘This is state aid, a tax construction solely intended to solve a problem for one company which other companies cannot take advantage of,’ he told Trouw. 

In 2016 the European Commission ordered Apple to pay €13 billion in back taxes after ruling that its agreement with the Irish tax service was anti-competitive. 

Around 40% of Shell’s shareholders are based in the UK. The remaining 60% are liable to pay dividend tax in the Netherlands. The current government has agreed to abolish dividend tax for foreign-based shareholders after being lobbied by Shell and Unilever during last year’s coalition negotiations. 

Last year online retailer Amazon was ordered to pay €250 million in tax to Luxembourg after it was found to have gained an unfair competitive advantage through its tax arrangements, while Starbucks’s deal with the Dutch tax authorities also fell foul of European regulations. The coffee chain, which has its European headquarters in Amsterdam, was told to pay €25.7 million. Apple, Amazon and Starbucks have all appealed against their respective rulings.

Spain: HSBC Whistleblower Released Pending Extradition Case

News965 - Yahoo, Jamey Keaten contributed from Geneva, April 5, 2018

MADRID -  Spanish authorities temporarily released a whistleblower in a major banking tax evasion scandal Thursday while a judge decides whether to extradite him to Switzerland, where he faces a 5-year prison sentence for economic espionage.

Herve Falciani, a former technology specialist at a subsidiary of HSBC bank, was arrested by Spanish police on Wednesday as part of a yearslong Swiss effort to detain him. Falciani, a French citizen, was tried in absentia in Switzerland and has not made himself available to Swiss authorities.

A Swiss court ruled in 2015 that Falciani illegally leaked a massive amount of account information that led to a global wave of tax evasion probes. Falciani also was convicted of illegally obtaining data and breaching business confidentiality and bank secrecy.

In Madrid on Thursday, a National Court judge released Falciani from custody, but confiscated his passport, limited his freedom of movement within Spain and ordered him put under police surveillance.

Anti-corruption activists consider Falciani a crucial whistleblower whose more than 100,000 records on prominent clients of HSBC Private Bank (Suisse) SA led to probes in several countries of alleged tax-dodging by wealthy people around the world.

The data, allegedly detailing accounts worth $100 billion, first emerged in press reports in 2008. Falciani then released the information to French tax authorities, who later shared it with Spain and other governments.

Falciani moved to Spain and cooperated with prosecutors there in some of the probes. He was arrested in Barcelona in 2012, but Spain's National Court denied a Swiss request to extradite him on the grounds that breaking secrecy laws was not subject to prosecution in Spain.

His arrest in Madrid came nearly two years after Falciani's conviction was made final by Swiss courts.

It also coincided with Spain's efforts to seek extradition from Switzerland of Marta Rovira, a prominent Catalan separatist politician considered key in the Spanish region's illegal independence bid. Swiss authorities have not ruled yet on whether she should be extradited.

Spanish Minister of Justice Rafael Catala said the government had no involvement in Falciani's arrest and that no connection should be made between the two cases.

"These are judicial cases sought in the realm of international cooperation," Catala said Thursday. "We shouldn't see into it more than that."

Confusion surrounded the origins of the new effort to bring Falciani into custody.

Lawyer Marc Henzelin, who represents Falciani in Switzerland, and Spanish police said Swiss authorities asked Spanish counterparts in mid-March to arrest the IT specialist.

But Folco Galli, a spokesman for Switzerland's Federal Office of Justice, said it was "completely wrong" to suggest that Swiss authorities have been seeking Falciani's arrest only since March.

He said Falciani has been listed since 2009 as a wanted person for extradition under the Schengen zone's notification system — first on the basis of an arrest warrant issued by a Swiss prosecutor that year, then based on the 2015 criminal convictions.

"On March 19, Spanish authorities told us that the search for Mr. Falciani was valid for Spanish territory," said Galli. He declined to say whether such a step was unusual, because cooperation on such cases between states is confidential.

The Federal office of Justice said that, following word of Falciani's arrest, Swiss authorities made a fresh formal extradition request Thursday.

Henzelin, Falciani's lawyer, noted a "hypothesis" among some, which he could not confirm, that the arrest could be connected to a "sort of deal" between Spain and Switzerland over a transfer of Catalan separatists who are wanted by Spanish authorities.

"I'm not able to verify that, but frankly if it were the case, I would consider that rather odious," said Henzelin. "It's not in the tradition of Swiss justice to do such a kind of bargaining. It seems to me it's more the habit of Russia and countries like that."

X.net, a platform of internet activists that cooperated with Falciani in some investigations into corruption and tax evasion, criticized the arrest.

"Whistleblowers of corruption used as exchange currency. What justice is this?" the platform wondered in a tweet.

Spanish defense lawyer Manuel Olle said the country's National Court had already ruled out Falciani's extradition in 2013.

"He can't be tried twice," Olle said, adding that he believed that the case was politically motivated.

Herve Falciani leaked documents allegedly indicating that HSBC's Swiss private banking arm helped more than 120,000 clients to hide 180.6 billion euros ($222 billion) from tax authorities https://t.co/nnuinM56CG

— AFP news agency (@AFP) April 5, 2018