«Secrecy For Sale: Inside The Global Offshore Money Maze»

Many believe that the battle with offshore companies is just an excuse to cover up other aims.

An overview of the world's media shows that in many of the reports, the main targets are not the offshore companies as such, but individual oligarchs, politicians and government officials.

Individual countries are also cited as «targets».

World-renowned banks, transnational corporations and financial groups are also sometimes cited.

One theory behind the operation's true motives is that it is specifically aimed at dealing a blow to certain offshore companies in order to outrun the money and clients in a small group of «select» and «untouchable» offshore companies. Note that almost all of the documents in the DOC relate to an offshore territory called the British Virgin Islands (BVI). Owing to a high level of confidentiality regarding information on company owners, this area is one of the most reliable and popular offshore territories. Since 1984, when the British overseas territory declared itself a «tax haven», the islands have sold more than one million companies, the true owners of which have never been revealed. As well as the BVI, other offshore territories are mentioned in the ICIJ press release, including Singapore, Hong Kong and the Cook Islands. However, it should be emphasised that they are mentioned only insofar as they serve as «offshoots» of the British Virgin Islands.

There are also other theories behind the operation's true goals: not to «blitz» a particular offshore company, but to stabilise the global economy as a whole, to cause a political crisis in certain countries and, ultimately, to move the world into a state of controlled chaos. Moreover, the operation «Offshore leaks» is not regarded as self-contained, but as part of a much larger, global plan. In which case, operation «Offshore leaks» is a logical continuation of the operation to undermine the banking system of the offshore island of Cyprus. 

Of course, one can only judge the aims of operation «Offshore leaks» hypothetically. The most important organisation involved in the project, ICIJ, itself raises a number of questions.

>>http://theartof12.blogspot.com/2013/04/likely-largest-journalism-collaboration.html 

>>http://theartof12.blogspot.com/2013/04/a-trail-of-blood-and-money-by-ralph.html

There is little information about it. All that is known is that it was established in 1997, its headquarters are situated in Washington and it includes nearly 160 journalists from 60 countries (88 journalists from 46 countries were involved in operation «Offshore leaks»). ICIJ was created as a project of the large non-profit organisation Center for Public Integrity (CPI). The Knight Foundation, the Ford Foundation and George Soros all act as sponsors of CPI. All of this inclines one to think that the operation really does have global aims.

The central characters of «Offshore leaks»

In the first batch of materials published in the media, we see all kinds of people. They are able to appear in the documents under a variety of titles: beneficiary, shareholder, proprietor, owner, recipient of «trust services», director, owner, co-owner, principal etc. They are all nevertheless united by the fact that they are «tax evaders». The list includes the names of politicians and government officials, businessmen and speculators, members of wealthy families and bankers from a variety of countries – the USA, Great Britain, France, Canada and Germany to Russia, the Ukraine, Mongolia, Azerbaijan, Venezuela, Iran, Indonesia, India and the Philippines. The Guardian points out that according to the documentation, the largest number of offshore company owners are located in China, Hong Kong, Taiwan, the Russian Federation and former Soviet republics. The list also includes the names of 4,000 US citizens.

http://www.strategic-culture.org/news/2013/04/17/a-pogrom-of-offshore-companies-or-operation-offshore-leaks.html