Major EU States Call G20 to List Shell Companies Amid Panama Leaks

MOSCOW (Sputnik) — Five major European countries urged the G20 to establish a list of shell companies' owners, which would allow to impose sanctions on states where the companies belong, France's Finance Minister Michel Sapin said.

The G20 finance ministers and central bank governors were slated to discuss the so-called Panama Papers leak in Washington, DC on April 13-14. On Thursday, France, Germany, the United Kingdom, Italy and Spain issued a joint letter, where they called on the G20 to unveil the identity of the shell companies' owners.

"We want the lists that allow imposing sanctions against the countries that do not respect the rules," Sapin told reporters on Thursday during the presentation of the letter, as quoted by Le Figaro.

The five ministers are also planning to launch an initiative on exchange of information on the shell companies.

On April 3, Germany’s Suddeutsche Zeitung published materials it claimed came from Mossack Fonseca, a Panama-based firm that sells offshore shell companies, exposing alleged involvement of a number of world leaders and their circles in tax havens schemes.

Mossack Fonseca responded to the leak by refusing to validate the information and accused reporters of gaining unauthorized access to its proprietary documents. It warned that the move was a crime that it would not hesitate to punish by legal means.