"ICIJ and its partners endeavour to publish these primary source documents alongside investigative stories wherever possible. Documents are reviewed and redacted where appropriate but are rich in information and were critical to ICIJ’s reporting," the organization said in a statement.
A total of 118 files have been uploaded on the consortium's website, including company incorporation records, real estate contracts, due-diligence questionnaires, copies of passports, bank statements, tax declarations, and other details that can be used to track tax evasion schemes.
The released files contain data on the beneficial owners of more than 15,000 offshore entities, including Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis, King of Jordan Abdullah II, former UK Prime Minister Tony Blair, President of Montenegro Milo Dukanovic, Gabon's President Ali Bongo, former Lebanese Prime Minister Hassan Diab, former President of Paraguay Horacio Cartes, daughter of Kazakhstan's former president Dariga Nazarbayeva, and daughter of Angola's former president Isabel dos Santos, among others.
The files are part of the Pandora Papers investigation, published by the ICIJ on October 3, which became the largest leak of tax haven data in recent history. The ICIJ has obtained more than 11.9 million financial records, containing 2.94 terabytes of confidential information from 14 offshore service providers.
The investigation alleges that over 35 current and former world leaders, and about 400 officials from more than 100 countries, have been involved in offshore schemes and tax evasion.