Special Report:Global Financial Crisis
GENEVA, Feb. 25 (Chinese media) -- Swiss Finance Minister
Hans-Rudolf Merz has launched a special task force to try to defend banking
secrecy in the face of mounting international pressure, the official Swissinfo
news website reported Wednesday.
Merz will enlist the help of bankers, diplomats,
economists and legal experts to help ward off attacks, according the report.
Banking secrecy is a fundamental pillar of the Swiss
financial center and has helped it corner nearly a third of the world's private
banking business. But it also stands accused of helping wealthy foreigners dodge
taxes in their own countries.
On Wednesday UBS, Switzerland's largest bank, paid
780 million U.S. dollars in fines to the U.S. authorities and agreed to hand
over details of 250-300 U.S. customers to avert criminal proceedings relating to
a tax evasion investigation.
The United States, however, has demanded details of
another 52,000 UBS clients. Major European Union countries such as Germany and
France have also increased their pressure on Switzerland over its banking
secrecy law.
"Pressure has been building up on an international
level about the tax system. We need legal experts, those who know the situation
in the U.S. and in Switzerland. Also bankers, economists and people with
diplomatic expertise," Merz was quoted by Swissinfo as saying.
"We have to take decisions on strategic issues in the
next few days," he said.
According to the report, Swiss Justice Minister
Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf will raise the issue of banking secrecy during a trip to
the Washington next week.
Switzerland faces challenge to sustain
banking secrecy
GENEVA, Feb. 24 (Chinese media) -- With the United States' increasing demand for
bank client data and European neighbors complaining about its banking secrecy,
Switzerland now faces a tough challenge to sustain its banking secrecy system,
analysts say.
Switzerland's largest bank UBS and the country's financial supervisory
authority Finma last week had to yield to months of pressure from the U.S.
authorities, who accused UBS of helping thousands of its citizens illegally
dodge taxes. Full story
UBS to pay $780 mln to U.S. to settle
tax case
WASHINGTON, Feb. 18 (Chinese media) -- Switzerland's largest bank
UBS AG has agreed to pay 780 million U.S. dollars to the U.S. government to
settle charges of conspiring to defraud the United States by impeding the
Internal Revenue Service (IRS), the Justice Department said Wednesday.
"As part of the deferred prosecution agreement and in an
unprecedented move, UBS, based on an order by the Swiss Financial Markets
Supervisory Authority, has agreed to immediately provide the United States
government with the identities of, and account information for, certain United
States customers of UBS's cross-border business," the department said in a
statement. Full story
information on 52,000 customers
WASHINGTON, Feb. 19 (Chinese media) -- UBS AG, Switzerland's largest bank, refused
on Thursday to provide information on 52,000 U.S. clients as demanded by the
U.S. government in a lawsuit filed earlier in the day in Miami, Florida.
The U.S. government filed the lawsuit against UBS, asking the court to order
the Swiss banking giant to disclose to the U.S. tax authorities the identities
of the international bank's U.S. customers with secret Swiss accounts, according
to a press release by the U.S. Justice Department. Full story
U.S. requests Swiss help in UBS probe
GENEVA, June 15 (Chinese media) -- The U.S. authorities have
asked the Swiss government for help in an investigation into cross border
services provided by the bank UBS, the official Swissinfo news website reported
on Sunday.
Switzerland is examining whether it can assist in the
request, said Folco Galli of the Swiss federal prosecutor's office on Sunday.
Further details of the request have not been released. Full story
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