Quote:Millions of documents show heads of state, criminals and celebrities using secret hideaways in tax havens. A massive leak of documents exposes the offshore holdings of 12 current and former world leaders and reveals how associates of Russian President Vladimir Putin secretly shuffled as much as $2 billion through banks and shadow companies. The leak also provides details of the hidden financial dealings of 128 more politicians and public officials around the world. The cache of 11.5 million records shows how a global industry of law firms and big banks sells financial secrecy to politicians, fraudsters and drug traffickers as well as billionaires, celebrities and sports stars. These are among the findings of a year-long investigation by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists including The Irish Times, German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung and more than 100 other news organisations.
Stories of Irish interest arising from this investigation will be published by The Irish Times over the coming days. Included in the leaked documents are sales promotion agreements an Irish-registered company with an address in Drumcondra, Dublin, has signed in relation to arms and other deals in India, the Philippines and elsewhere, often involving commission-sharing deals with offshore companies. The files expose offshore companies controlled by the prime ministers of Iceland and Pakistan, the king of Saudi Arabia and the children of the president of Azerbaijan. They also include at least 33 people and companies blacklisted by the US government because of evidence that they’ve done business with Mexican drug lords, terrorist organisations such as Hezbollah or rogue states like North Korea and Iran.
Why isn't this leading every news page and broadcast, world wide?! (takes a deep breath) .... The article run in The Guardian (as well as another in the BBC) sums it up by saying the US State Department leaks and combat action report databases of the war are DWARFED by this in both sheer physical size as well as importance of the data for the implications of its release. Hell, this makes the Pentagon Papers look like a minor policy paper with bad news.
(staggered)
I'm just dumbfounded... I'm also a little sick with one BIG question. All the stories breaking with this cite investigations and national efforts based on this material, but before that? All simply refer to it as leaked internal documents (TWO TERRABYTES WORTH, but still leaked docs). WHO leaked them, originally, and why??
The focus seems to be on Putin (which is like focusing on one CAMP GUARD for the whole evil of the German war machine of world war II), when this covers 40 YEARS of time and this same high level of people and places doing their dirty deeds in near open sight. The US really hates Putin right now ..... Ergo ... Oh... No.....
PLEASE DON'T TELL ME THIS STARTED AS AN OBAMA BRAIN FART LEAK?! Similar things DID happen in the past, on a MUCH smaller scale of course, with things like the air raids into Syria by Israeli in past years. The White House isn't supposed to be giving the play-by-play of such things like its a spectator sport, but they've been known to burn some VERY VERY sensitive items as well as methods if it served a political purpose.
.....the length of time this has been out in the hands of this enormous group of journalists ALSO makes me wonder, as we see a public focus on Putin (of all individuals to focus on in this "tell-all" who's who of world wide corruption). It's been a couple years, which puts the time this first came to light as about right to the forerunner efforts toward the Ukraine and applying serious, sustained pressure on Russia as well as Putin as an individual.
.....but..no.please..oh no...don't tell me THIS ever ..ever..in even a passing WAY...gets traced back to United States entities. We're so screwed with world trust and ability to work with them after Manning and Snowden as it is. Something like this? If it CAME from US sources? We might as well close our Embassies world wide. They won't serve much purpose to anyone beyond a weigh station for immigrants to touch base on their way into our nation. NO one will see them as places where sensitive business may ever be conducted. Not...if this may have come that way???
.....a story to watch, on MANY LEVELS ....as I've counted at least FOUR sitting Western leaders these papers implicate in verifiable high crimes of outright embezzelement or such gray area action, that it may become politically impossible for them to remain leaders in their respective nations ..and good Lord, I've only skimmed the summary stories of this MOUNTAIN of information!!!
Folks ... Unless someone pops up to say "April Fools!!!"...then I believe THIS one is the most damaging thing we've seen pop in decades, if not EVER.....for exposing the inner corrupt workings within the UPPER echelons of power and money in the world ....WHILE the actions are STILL BEING COMMITTED and in ACTIONABLE ways for criminal prosecution!
This ....IS....HUGE! (Unless, again, somehow this all isn't real after all? I mean...it's THAT BIG, IMO ... Hard to believe its real at all)
Also, unlike the little 'gate keepers of truth' who hold the Snowden papers SO tightly, they estimate it'll be sometime decades from now before the public sees it all? THIS collection is apparently being turned public in May. So, we don't have to take the words of the journalists in trying to know what has happened in all this. We can read through it all ourselves and data mine our own connections out, as we each may be interested to look for them.
05-24-2016, 08:22 AM (This post was last modified: 05-24-2016, 08:23 AM by Wrabbit2000.)
Another bit of context and info....
This comes from RT, so credibility is always a factor in news sources...but this seems relatively breaking for the reporting to be sincerely mistaken OR pretty accurate at this early stage. We'll see, but this gives a hair more about background.
Quote:Germany’s Süddeutsche Zeitung (SZ) has released the biggest leak in journalistic history, posting 11.5 million documents from a Panamanian law firm online and providing “rare insights into a world that can only exist in the shadows.”
SZ said it received the law firm’s documents a year ago from an anonymous source who “wanted neither financial compensation nor anything else in return.”
The German paper obtained further documents in an investigation that followed, involving “400 journalists from more than 100 media organizations in over 80 countries.”
SZ said it decided to analyze the data in cooperation with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ).
.....and here is the response (or damage control out front, actually) of the Panamanian company:
The plot thickens....
Sadly, I'll bet more than one customer thought the date made it something less than serious, as the letter from them DID apparently land on April 1st. Oh Ouch.... No fools but the people claiming they had security, by how it looks. Over 2 Terra and 11+ MILLION documents isn't 'an Email server' or 'a small breach'. It sounds like they had the run of the place and ...assuming those represent 2+ Terra of UNIQUE data and not archives over archives (That is almost silly for an amount of data within the realm of text and document material) and duplicate files? It really sounds like hackers got their copy of original data for whatever they really wanted to get.
The thing is..the stories also indicate that data started a year ago, but dates right into Dec. 2015, or in one example for a story out there, carries INTO 2016! So... was this a blind leak or a very active and ongoing whistle blower inside this Panamanian company??
Indeed.. This plot has a LOT to go for thickening, I'm thinking...and this all this started breaking in the past few hours by what I can tell for origins and time. It hasn't even had time to be seen by all the time zones it will come to impact in the coming weeks, months and perhaps even years.
History in the process of being made, I do believe ... Interesting times.
Well, Corey Goode did say that "the good guys" were working on releasing information that would make the public react with complete disbelieve at what's been going on behind closed doors. He said when the public learns about all the dirty deals the politicians are involved in, the masses will "wake up"... finally, and take the necessary steps to get the corruption out of the system. Too bad the public had to let things go so far before realizing the truth.
I'm not sure how much the public itself will care. The average Homer Simpson voter or man on the street will probably care very little after the scandal-after-scandal has worn people down at this point.
However, every political and actual enemy of anyone even peripherally named as doing something wrong in this, or close enough to question a benefit of the doubt? Look out! Something like this? Oh ..my ... gawd. EACH of the individual men of world power level *COULD* represent the tip of another Iran/Contra level scandal BEHIND the money and movement of funds which this simply connects them to in the first place.
As this just breaks today, we don't even have a 100% certain feel for who is named within the 'first tier' of targets/victims within the documents. Who will THEY then implicate to save their OWN tails in their own home nations....as more than one nation has already been in active progress toward prosecution or at least, investigation of wrong doing at high levels?
I dunno if this is "that thread"....but there ARE stories in the world which, if broken wide open and without regard for consequence or secondary "explosions", would represent the thread to unravel SO MUCH MORE.
....I dunno is this is that, but it could be. It sure SOUNDS like it may have the potential in this early stage of release.
This is moving fast and the reactions look to be as major as the story would suggest they'd be. First, this is the note listed on BreakingNews.com by the editorial staff. BreakingNews is an affiliate of NBC News, as a side note for their origin and backing/resources.
Quote:Editor's note: Earlier on Sunday, Süddeutsche Zeitung, a German newspaper working with the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists, released the "Panama Papers," an online data journalism project of leaked documents that claims to reveal the offshore links of some of the world’s most prominent people. According to the Guardian, the leak is one of the biggest ever, comprising 11.5 million documents and 2.6 terabytes of information drawn from Mossack Fonseca’s internal database. Mossack Fonseca, according to the Guardian, is a Panama-based law firm whose services include incorporating companies in offshore jurisdictions such as the British Virgin Islands. The firm is the world’s fourth biggest provider of offshore services and has acted for more than 300,000 companies. We're following the story on this arc, and we will post updates, reactions and fallout. - Rebecca
Iceland’s PM faces calls for snap election after offshore revelations
Quote:Iceland’s prime minister is this week expected to face calls in parliament for a snap election after the Panama Papers revealed he is among several leading politicians around the world with links to secretive companies in offshore tax havens.
The financial affairs of Sigmundur Davíð Gunnlaugsson and his wife have come under scrutiny because of details revealed in documents from a Panamanian law firm that helps clients protect their wealth in secretive offshore tax regimes. The files from Mossack Fonseca form the biggest ever data leak to journalists.
I think the people working on this for a year have been professional, working Journalists (The ICIJ is made up of the WORKING variety, not the talking heads who read scripts). So, at the end here, they figure they ought to have a month to run exclusive under their own bylines to what parts or aspects mean the most to them. That is my guess for how simple the May time frame is. Within a month, exclusive will mean nothing either way and any personal benefit to be milked for all the work they put into getting it this far will rightly have faded.
Time enough to let the workers enjoy their 15 minutes ..then we'll all get to the meat and potatoes.
I find it interesting that during Obama's remarks today he talked about what the hack shows, and very particular toward the people it refers to and whom HE dislikes personally.
What he didn't seem to make a mention of was the criminal nature of the hack. In fact, this is the largest criminal leak/hack in the history of the world business community.
Now...am I suggesting that somehow makes it less important? No.. Of course not. However, this President is die hard to catch and bag Snowden. He sure didn't seem amused when the hack/leak came from inside his own camp, and in fact, he instituted new 'inside threat' programs across the entire Government to insure no one like Snowden was likely to come again. Yet.....the President of the United States of America has not a single comment about the outrageously criminal nature of what is going to hurt hundreds, if not thousands of people and has already changed the course of one nation in the world today.
Odd for that to be missing, IMO. Just odd....given that we're the nation claiming legal high ground and principle on a regular basis.
So - if this is the 4th largest such law-firm... What is hiding in the servers and archives of the 1st, 2nd and 3rd largest off-shore firms?
One nation's criminal is another's hero.
Sadly - all the Homer Simpsons (thanks @Wrabbit') have been so shell-shocked from all the scandals for the last 50+ years, that they don't believe...or dare, anymore to hope...that the tables will be righted, regardless of how damning the information/leak.
I am coming to be of the opinion this was a hack job from outside (as the company has officially filed with the Panamanian Authorities earlier this afternoon) and that it wasn't intended or even considered to do near the damage it will.
I am starting to really think some people with intentions they believed to be good in rooting out tax cheats and 'insuring everyone pays their fair share' may have done this, and a disturbing thought, perhaps from the inside of the U.S. Government. Who the hack traces back to remains to be seen, but it'll hit much much further than just politicians and corporate scumbag behavior.
After all, lots of people use shell companies for lots of things. Among them...Intelligence and Security services all over the world, and every day of the week. They don't have magical 'spook companies' to go register them with, but blend in BY using what everyone else does. Like, say, a law firm in Panama that specializes in such things from a 40 year track record.
Right now? We're just seeing the political window dressing and corporate side shows. The REAL and lasting damage comes with NON-Journalists start cross referencing raw data and names with entirely different lists and databases to make connections several levels beyond the obvious.
This story hasn't even begun yet, is my general take. The layers run like an onion for each just exposing another, so far.
05-24-2016, 08:39 AM (This post was last modified: 05-24-2016, 08:40 AM by Mystic Wanderer.)
Ahh... Yes, yes, yes! :)
New names have been released, and Hillary is right in there with them. :D
Quote:On Tuesday, Zero Hedge released some of the American names from the leak, yet no recognizable politicians were listed. However, it at least sheds light on what the Western media machine has been reticent to release to the public—that some Americans were involved in the Panamanian scandal.
Mossack Fonseca has at least 400 American clients, yet none of them are being revealed by "trusted" media outlets who were given access to the documents. Thankfully, the team at McClatchyDC released a shortlist earlier this week.
One high-level American not named by McClatchy, but who played an instrumental role in fostering the trade deal with Panama, was presidential hopeful Hillary Clinton.
In 2011, the Panama-United States Trade Promotion Agreement was proposed in Congress and later ratified in 2012. Bernie Sanders warned that the bill would create tax havens in Panama, which already had a history of being a tax shelter for wealthy Americans.
Clinton's involvement in the deal that enabled tax havens to flourish could end her presidential bid in 2016. One wonders if this is by design or reveals how turbulent the current climate of worldly power is—because apparently last year, the Bilderberg group backed Clinton.
Clinton has already been implicated in several scandals that would have ended her career if not for the cooperation of the media. It seems that they are also doing their best to hide her involvement in the Panama Papers, suggesting that she is the establishment-anointed candidate for 2016.
The German newspaper, Süddeutsche Zeitung, intends on releasing a more robust list of Mossack Fonseca clients at the end of this month that could implicate more Americans for wrongdoing.
....and in other news .....IRS Officials confirm records indicating all those missing hard drives actually do exist and can be found stored in the baseme.......errrr.....
Updating this thread with this information: Panama Papers: Vancouver is Canada’s hotspot for secret tax haven firms, with hundreds of addresses in leaked papers
06-03-2016, 07:22 PM (This post was last modified: 06-03-2016, 07:23 PM by BIAD.)
(06-03-2016, 07:13 PM)Mystic Wanderer Wrote: Updating this thread with this information: Panama Papers: Vancouver is Canada’s hotspot for secret tax haven firms, with hundreds of addresses in leaked papers
11-29-2018, 11:51 AM (This post was last modified: 11-29-2018, 11:51 AM by BIAD.)
(05-24-2016, 08:38 AM)Wrabbit2000 Wrote: ...Right now? We're just seeing the political window dressing and corporate side shows.
The REAL and lasting damage comes with NON-Journalists start cross referencing raw data and names with entirely
different lists and databases to make connections several levels beyond the obvious.
This story hasn't even begun yet, is my general take. The layers run like an onion for each just exposing another, so far.
We may tend to think 'The Swamp' is located in Washington DC where powerful officials deal with lobbyists with
the hopes they'll bring in financial benefits for themselves by succumbing to companies who attempt to influence
legislators.
It's true to some extent, but the real swamp is wider and really more of a web that links many countries to those
who dabble in political influence. The Panama Papers were revealed in 2016 and for a while in the mainstream
media, the stink of corruption was in everyone's nostrils.
Wrabbit 2000 was correct at the time of his writing, the story hadn't truly begun. But now it seems there's some
movement towards discovering the houses where vast amounts of money wee stored and laundered.
We're two years on and I'd wager we're still a long way off in realising how the Elite play by a different set of rules
to the ones they preach to the masses.
Quote:Deutsche Bank headquarters raided over money laundering.
'The Frankfurt headquarters of Deutsche Bank have been raided by prosecutors in a money laundering investigation. Germany's public prosecutor alleged that two staff members have helped clients launder money from criminal activities. Police cars were seen outside the tower blocks that house the headquarters of Germany's biggest bank.
Other Deutsche offices in the city were searched in an operation involving about 170 police and officials. Prosecutors are looking into whether Deutsche Bank staff helped clients set up off-shore accounts to "transfer money from criminal activities".
The investigation was sparked by revelations in the 2016 "Panama Papers" - an enormous amount of information leaked from one of the world's most secretive companies, a Panamanian law firm called Mossack Fonseca. Other banks, including Sweden's Nordea and Germany's Handelsbanken have been fined as a result of information contained in the Panama Papers.
Deutsche Bank shares fell 3% after news of the raid emerged. The company confirmed that police had raided several locations in Germany and that it was co-operating fully with the probe. Paperwork and electronic documents were seized by officials during the raids on the bank's properties...'
As Bob Woodwood said about the Watergate scandal... "Everyone is involved" and somewhere there's the missing-link
that ties all the latest problems we're seeing in the media, together.
![[Image: 700_c73fc3dea6689aacbf97773ad1038288.jpg?v=1459709814]](http://d38zt8ehae1tnt.cloudfront.net/images/news/700_c73fc3dea6689aacbf97773ad1038288.jpg?v=1459709814)
![[Image: 5701674cc36188fe108b45a6.jpg]](http://factcc.net/cpg/albums/userpics/10002/5701674cc36188fe108b45a6.jpg)
![[Image: mossak-fonseca.png]](http://factcc.net/cpg/albums/userpics/10002/mossak-fonseca.png)
