Details of Panama Papers released online by Journalists consortium
The International Consortium of Investigative Journalists publishes today a searchable database that strips away the secrecy of nearly 214,000 offshore entities created in 21 jurisdictions, from Nevada to Hong Kong and the British Virgin Islands.
The data, part of the Panama Papers investigation, is the largest ever release of information about offshore companies and the people behind them. This includes, when available, the names of the real owners of those opaque structures.
The database also displays information about more than 100,000 additional offshore entities ICIJ had already disclosed in its 2013 Offshore Leaks investigation.
ICIJ said, the searchable database built on just a portion of the documents leaked from the Panama law firm Mossack Fonseca reveals more than 3 lakh 60,000 names of individuals and companies behind the anonymous shell firms.
It said, it is publishing the information in the public interest as a global movement against tax evasion and the secrecy. The consortium, however, said it was not making available raw records online, nor was it putting all the information from the records out.
Reports already published in April based on the dossier linked some of the world’s most powerful leaders, including Russian President Vladimir Putin, British Prime Minister David Cameron and others to unreported offshore companies. Nearly 500 Indians were also named in the papers.
The data forced the resignations of Iceland’s Prime Minister Sigmundur David Gunnlaugsson, and Spain’s industry minister Jose Manuel Soria.Until now access to the total cache of 11.5 million documents, originally provided by a mysterious “John Doe”, was restricted to the ICIJ and a select group of international media houses.
