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The European Commission has today opened a state aid probe into the tax affairs of furniture giant Ikea with the Netherlands. This new case shows Europe still has to put its own house in order when it comes to ending tax havens within the EU.

EU finance ministers today discussed the future "EU blacklist" for tax havens. The proposal says that a 0% tax rate will only be seen as an "indicator" that a particular country or a tax jurisdiction should be screened - but that further analysis will be required before they end up on any blacklist.In reaction, Oxfam’s EU tax expert Aurore Chardonnet said:“It's welcome that the EU now accepts that a 0% tax rate is potentially harmful, but it is more serious than simply being an ‘indicator’ that warrants investigation. A 0% tax…

EU finance ministers have today adopted the first EU blacklist of tax havens. The list includes 17 mostly small countries. The EU has also published an additional grey list of countries that currently qualify as tax havens, but have promised reforms.Reacting to the news, Aurore Chardonnet, Oxfam EU policy advisor on inequality and tax, said:“It is disturbing to see mostly small countries on the EU blacklist, while the most notorious tax havens got away on the ‘grey list’.“It seems the EU’s pressure has obliged some of the most notorious tax havens like…

Europe’s 20 biggest banks are registering over a quarter of their profits in tax havens – well out of proportion to the level of real economic activity that occurs there, according to a new report by Oxfam and the Fair Finance Guide International today.

EU finance ministers look set to whitewash nine of the world’s worst tax havens when they update the EU tax haven blacklist next week, says Oxfam.

Bermuda, the Netherlands, Ireland and Luxembourg are among the world’s 15 worst corporate tax havens, according to new Oxfam research published today.

According to the Paris-based Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development, just one country fails to comply with international transparency standards, which Oxfam strongly disputes.Trinidad and Tobago is the only tax haven identified by the OECD as failing to comply with international transparency standards, despite extremely weak commitments by the US, the Bahamas and other countries. Also escaping blacklisting were the Netherlands, Bermuda, Mauritius and Singapore, among others, all of which featured on an …

European Union finance ministers have removed the British territory of Bermuda, Barbados, and the Dutch Caribbean island of Aruba from the EU blacklist of tax havens today.

Responding to the announcement that the Cayman Islands has been removed from the EU tax haven blacklist, Chiara Putaturo, Oxfam’s EU Tax Policy Advisor, said: “While we welcome the addition of Barbados, removing the Cayman Islands, one of the world’s most notorious tax havens, from the EU tax haven blacklist is further proof that the process isn’t working."    

More than 300 leading economists from 30 countries have today written to world leaders warning that there is no economic justification for allowing tax havens to continue, and urging them to bring an end to offshore financial secrecy. The letter comes ahead of the UK Government’s summit on offshore corruption in London on Thursday, which politicians from 40 countries as well as World Bank and IMF representatives are expected to attend.