Swiss private bank Julius Baer handed over to
US authorities information on more than 2,500 of its employees as part
of Washington's efforts to clamp down on tax evasion, a newspaper
reported Friday.
The Zurich-based bank is believed to be the latest to bend to Washington's demands to release names of staff who could have helped clients avoid paying tax in the United States, Le Temps newspaper said.
In addition to providing personal information about staff to the US tax authorities, Baer is said to have made available personal documents, emails and details of telephone calls.
Such information would make it possible for the US tax authorities to find out the names of Swiss bank clients whose identities are protected by Swiss banking secrecy laws, the report said.
The newspaper cited as its source lawyer Douglas Hornung, the legal representative of a former HSBC executive whose name was one of more than 1,000 given to the US tax office.
Referring to "three different sources" in a recent letter to Swiss president Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf, excepts of which were published by Le Temps, Hornung wrote that Baer "gave more than 2,500 dossiers to the US, and that HSBC had handed over approximately 1,100."
He said that violated Switzerland's federal law on data protection and brings the total number of names handed over by the 11 banks in Washington's sights to 10,000.
The data concerns current and former staff, as well as outside contractors, the report added.
President Widmer-Schlumpf, who is also the country's finance minister, recently announced that she hoped to resolve differences with Washington on the tax issue this year.
"Swiss banks have asked the (Swiss) federal council's authorisation to send information on employees, but not of clients, as part of their investigation by the United States," said a spokeswoman for the State Secretariat for International Financial Matters (SIF).
"This request is independent of the efforts undertaken by the SIF to reach a global solution with the US" similar to those agreed with Germany and Britain, the spokeswoman added.
No one from Julius Baer was available to talk to AFP about the development.
The banks targeted by the United States are: Credit Suisse, Julius Baer, Wegelin, Banque cantonale de
Zurich (ZKB), la Banque cantonale de Bale (BKB), Neue Zuercher Bank (NZB), HSBC, LLB, in addition to the Israeli banks Leumi, Hapoalim and Mizrahi.
No comments:
Post a Comment