Thursday 15 March 2012

Lawmakers vote to relax Swiss secrecy for Holocaust funds

ZURICH (Reuters)

- Swiss lawmakers on Wednesday voted to relax strict secrecy laws to make it easier to liquidate unclaimed accounts held in Swiss banks, a major step forward in efforts to deal with wealth hidden by Jews from the Nazis during the Second World War. Though Switzerland's UBS and Credit Suisse reached a $1.25 billion deal with Holocaust survivors and their descendants in 1998, the Swiss government has spent years attempting to amend banking secrecy laws to try to deal with unclaimed accounts.

No comments: