John Christensen ■ The Economist – How to crack a shell

The Economist – How to crack a shell

John Christensen

Published:

6 May 2016

Reading time:

< 1

Category:

Financial secrecy ↘ Inequality and human rights ↘ Beneficial ownership registration ↘

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We love this cartoon from this week’s edition of The Economist, which comes from a lengthy article about the forthcoming anti-corruption summit in London.

As the opening paragraph makes clear, TJN has been pushing for many, many years for world leaders to crack down on secretive offshore shell companies, and we’re waiting to see whether Prime Minister David Cameron and his fellow leaders from around the world will finally yield to demands to have true ownership information available on publicly accessible registries.

“JOHN CHRISTENSEN runs the Tax Justice Network, a group that campaigns against tax evasion and corruption. A decade ago, its message fell on deaf ears. No longer. After the Panama papers leak last month, Mr Christensen says international media were camped at his door for days, seeking his views on how to stop dodgy dealings.
Corruption has flown up policy agendas, thanks to the work such crusading groups have done to reveal the extent of hidden offshore wealth to angry voters facing austerity. On May 12th Britain will host an anti-corruption summit. Officials from around 30 countries, including America, Brazil and Nigeria, will attend.”

Read the full article here. And read the new Corruption edition of our flagship newsletter, Tax Justice Focus, here.

The author

John Christensen

Trained as a forensic auditor and economist, John has worked in many countries around the world, including a period of working in offshore financial services with Touche Ross & Co. For 11 years he was economic adviser to the government of the British Channel Island of Jersey.In 2003 he became what the Guardian has described as “the unlikely figurehead of a worldwide campaign against tax avoidance.” His research on offshore finance has been widely published in books and academic journals, and John has taken part in many films, television documentaries and radio programmes.John can be contacted on +44 (0) 7979 868302.

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