James S. Henry: Panama Papers Reveal How the Rich and Powerful Hide Their Wealth

Award-winning Investigative Journalist Robert Parry (1949-2018)

Award-winning investigative journalist and founder/editor of ConsortiumNews.com, Robert Parry has passed away. His ground-breaking work uncovering Reagan-era dirty wars in Central America and many other illegal and immoral policies conducted by successive administrations and U.S. intelligence agencies, stands as an inspiration to all in journalists working in the public interest.

Robert had been a regular guest on our Between The Lines and Counterpoint radio shows -- and many other progressive outlets across the U.S. over four decades.

His penetrating analysis of U.S. foreign policy and international conflicts will be sorely missed, and not easily replaced. His son Nat Parry writes a tribute to his father: Robert Parry’s Legacy and the Future of Consortiumnews.

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The Resistance Starts Now!

Between The Lines' coverage and resource compilation of the Resistance Movement

"The man who predicted Trump presidential win now says Trump impeachment could happen," AM Joy with Joy Reid, MSNBC, Jan. 21, 2018
"Sketchy Kazakh money finds its way into Trump dealings," The Rachel Maddow Show, MSNBC, Jan. 15, 2018
"Red flags seen in many Trump real estate deals," The Rachel Maddow Show, MSNBC, Jan. 15, 2018
"Secret Money: How Trump Made Millions Selling Condos To Unknown Buyers," BuzzFeed, Jan. 12, 2018
"The Scandals of Donald Trump: Presidential Edition," The Atlantic, May 15, 2017
"Here's what we know so far about Team Trump's ties to Russian interests," Washington Post's ongoing compilation
"What Comey Was Investigating, Explained," The Moscow Project, Center for American Progress

"Donald Trump's Financial Ties to Russian Oligarchs and Mobsters Detailed In Explosive New Documentary from the Netherlands," Dutch TV documentary, Alternet.org, May 12, 2017
Ongoing compilation of Trump's creeping authoritarianism," MotherJones.com
Full resource list ...

SPECIAL REPORT: "The Resistance - Women's March 2018 - Hartford, Connecticut" Jan. 20, 2018

Selected speeches from the Women's March in Hartford, Connecticut 2018, recorded and produced by Scott Harris

SPECIAL REPORT: "No Fracking Waste in CT!" Jan. 14, 2018

Jen Siskind Jennifer Siskind, local coordinator for Food and Water Watch, describes the campaign to stop fracking waste in Connecticut, which so far has led to fracking waste bans in 34 towns around the state. Interviewed by Richard Hill on Mic Check, WPKN Radio, Bridgeport, CT

SPECIAL REPORT: "Resistance Round Table: The Unraveling Continues..." Jan. 13, 2018

Lindsay Kanaly The panel discusses Trump's long history of racism and the Republican voter suppression juggernaut confronting Democrats leading up to the 2018 elections. Special guest: Lindsay Kanaly, a lead organizer of the Women's Marches planned for Jan. 20, 2018. Panel: Scott Harris, Ruthanne Baumgartner and Richard Hill on Resistance Roundtable, WPKN Radio, Bridgeport, CT.

SPECIAL REPORT: "Capitalism to the ash heap?" Richard Wolff, Jan. 2, 2018

Richard Wolff, Economics professor Richard Wolff declares U.S. capitalism to be beyond repair and suggests the need for a radical alternative. Interviewed by Richard Hill

SPECIAL REPORT: Maryn McKenna, author of "Big Chicken", Dec. 7, 2017

Maryn McKenna, investigative journalist and author of Big Chicken, talks about the widespread use and dangers of antibiotics in commercial poultry, beef and fruit production. Interview by Bill Duesing, Richard Hill and Guy Beardsly on WPKN's Organic Farm Stand.

SPECIAL REPORT: Nina Turner's address, Working Families Party Awards Banquet, Dec. 14, 2017

Nina Turner, president of Our Revolution, talks about the fight ahead for progressives as she receives the Working Families Organization Award for Exceptional Leadership Towards Advancing Progress. The event was held in Meriden, CT. Produced by Richard Hill.

SPECIAL REPORT: Mic Check, Dec. 12, 2017

Working Families Party of CT talks strategy and issues for 2018.
Lindsay Farrell, executive director of the Working Families Party of Connecticut, discusses the state's electoral landscape and lays out the issues and strategies that could lead to progressive victories in 2018. Interviewed by Richard Hill.

SPECIAL REPORT: Resistance Roundtable, Dec. 9, 2017

Disturbing developments in the Trump/Republican Agenda
Focus on the tax bill, destruction of our public lands, North Korea and Trump's private CIA. Panel: Scott Harris, Ruthanne Baumgartner and Richard Hill. Special guest: Jo Macallero of Rise and Resist.

SPECIAL REPORT: On Tyranny - one year later, Nov. 28, 2017

Professor Timothy Snyder, author of the highly acclaimed resistance manual On Tyranny, discusses his book and offers a fresh assessment of the state of our beleaguered republic. Timothy Snyder, history professor at Yale, is introduced by Stanley Heller, administrator of Promoting Enduring Peace, a Connecticut-based organization that sponsored this event at the United Church Parish House in New Haven on Nov. 28. A brief interview with Snyder conducted by WPKN radio producer, Richard Hill, follows his talk.

SPECIAL REPORT: Mic Check, Nov. 12, 2017

Lynne Ide, director of program and policy with the Universal Health Care Foundation of Connecticut, talks about the current state of health care coverage in Connecticut. Interviewed by Richard Hill, WPKN radio producer

SPECIAL REPORT: Resistance Roundtable, Nov. 11, 2017

Focus on the Republican tax plan, the just-released autopsy on the Democratic Party, and Internet censorship by Google, Facebook and Youtube. Including an interview with Hilary Grant, a lead organizer with Action Together Connecticut, who discusses the local results of the recent election, with hosts Richard Hill, Scott Harris and Ruth Baumgartner WPKN producers

SPECIAL REPORT: Rainy Day Radio, Nov. 7, 2017

Two leaders from Redneck Revolt, an anti-racist, anti-capitalist movement, talk about their work organizing with white working class people in Suffolk County, New York. Interviewed by Richard Hill, WPKN radio producer

SPECIAL REPORT: Rainy Day Radio, Nov. 7, 2017

Bruce Gagnon, coordinator for the Global Network Against Weapons and Nuclear Power in Space, describes the extent of -- and motives underlying -- the vast US network of military bases around the globe. Interviewed by Richard Hill, WPKN radio producer

SPECIAL REPORT: Resisting U.S. JeJu Island military base in South Korea, Oct. 24, 2017

Joyakol, South Korean peace activist and singer, discusses the crisis on the Korean peninsula and focuses on the resistance to the U.S. huge military base being constructed on Jeju Island. The event was sponsored by the Greater New Haven Peace Council and this audio was recorded by Richard Hill, WPKN producer.
Joyakol discusses Americans' biggest misconceptions about the conflict between North and South Korea and the U.S., Interview by Richard Hill, WPKN producer.

SPECIAL REPORT: John Allen, Out in New Haven

John Allen, founding director of the New Haven Pride Center, Connecticut, talks about his new LGBTQ television show, Out in New Haven, which presents a range of political and cultural issues to the community. Interviewed by Richard Hill on WPKN's Rainy Day Tuesday, Jan. 2, 2018.

2017 Gandhi Peace Awards

Promoting Enduring Peace presented its Gandhi Peace Award jointly to renowned consumer advocate Ralph Nader and BDS founder Omar Barghouti on April 23, 2017.

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THANK YOU TO EVERYONE...

who helped make our 25th anniversary with Jeremy Scahill a success!

For those who missed the event, or were there and really wanted to fully absorb its import, here it is in video

Jeremy Scahill keynote speech, part 1 from PROUDEYEMEDIA on Vimeo.

Jeremy Scahill keynote speech, part 2 from PROUDEYEMEDIA on Vimeo.

Between The Lines on Stitcher

Between The Lines Presentation at the Left Forum 2016

"How Do We Build A Mass Movement to Reverse Runaway Inequality?" with Les Leopold, author of "Runaway Inequality: An Activist's Guide to Economic Justice,"May 22, 2016, John Jay College of Criminal Justice, The City University of New York, 860 11th Ave. (Between 58th and 59th), New York City. Between The Lines' Scott Harris and Richard Hill moderated this workshop. Listen to the audio/slideshows and more from this workshop.

Listen to audio of the plenary sessions from the weekend.

JEREMY SCAHILL: Oscar-nominated documentary filmmaker "Dirty Wars"

Listen to the full interview (30:33) with Jeremy Scahill, an award-winning investigative journalist with the Nation Magazine, correspondent for Democracy Now! and author of the bestselling book, "Blackwater: The Rise of the World's Most Powerful Mercenary Army," about America's outsourcing of its military. In an exclusive interview with Counterpoint's Scott Harris on Sept. 16, 2013, Scahill talks about his latest book, "Dirty Wars, The World is a Battlefield," also made into a documentary film under the same title, and was nominated Dec. 5, 2013 for an Academy Award in the Best Documentary Feature category.

Listen to Scott Harris Live on WPKN Radio

Between The Lines' Executive Producer Scott Harris hosts a live, weekly talk show, Counterpoint, from which some of Between The Lines' interviews are excerpted. Listen every Monday evening from 8 to 10 p.m. EDT at www.WPKN.org (Follows the 5-7 minute White Rose Calendar.)

Counterpoint in its entirety is archived after midnight ET Monday nights, and is available for at least a year following broadcast in WPKN Radio's Archives.

You can also listen to full unedited interview segments from Counterpoint, which are generally available some time the day following broadcast.

Subscribe to Counterpoint bulletins via our subscriptions page.

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Panama Papers Reveal How the World's Rich and Powerful Hide Their Wealth

Posted April 13, 2016

Interview with James S. Henry, senior fellow at Columbia University's Center for Sustainable International Investment and a senior advisor to the Tax Justice Network, conducted by Scott Harris

Most listeners will have heard or read about a set of leaked confidential files known as the Panama Papers, 11.5 million documents that provide detailed information on the shareholders and directors of more than 214,000 offshore corporations. The documents were leaked from the Panamanian-based law firm Mossack Fonseca that assists some of the world's richest people and corporations establish shell companies in low-tax haven nations used to conceal wealth.

The names of 140 politicians from more than 50 countries linked to secret offshore accounts in the documents, have thus far included the prime minister of Iceland, who was forced to resign, Pakistan’s prime minister, the presidents of Argentina and Ukraine, the king of Saudi Arabia, senior Chinese officials and some close associates of Russian President Vladimir Putin. British Prime Minister David Cameron’s father was also connected to a Panamanian off-shore account.

An anonymous source originally provided the Panama Papers to a German newspaper in early 2015, but due to the overwhelming volume of documents the editors sought help from the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists which distributed the data to 400 journalists at 107 media outlets across the world. Between The Lines' Scott Harris spoke with James S. Henry, a senior fellow at Columbia University's Center for Sustainable International Investment and a senior adviser to the Tax Justice Network, who assesses the significance of the leaked Panama Papers documents, which represents just the tip of the iceberg of where the world's wealthiest people and corporations hide their money in tax shelters.

JAMES S. HENRY: Well, this is by far the largest leak in history. We've had 214,438 companies that were set up by this company and the documents associated with those. The clients are from 200 countries and they include, so far, we've identified about 22 current heads of state, 143 people in political office, quite a few family members who are associated closely with the current and former heads of state and quite a few people on the Fortune 500 list. So it's an incredible accumulation of influential people. This case is about kleptocracy in terms of public officials helping themselves to public assets or having offshore wealth that they can't explain, maybe due to corruption and bribery.

And for many countries in the developing world, kleptocracy is a more important issue. Kleptocracy, corruption is a more important issue than just tax dodging.

BETWEEN THE LINES: I wonder if you could explain to our audience how the Mossack Fonseca revelations fit into the global tax avoidance that you've estimated at between $21 trillion and $32 trillion in private wealth in offshore tax havens. And that doesn't include the trillions of dollars more in wealth hidden by many global corporations.

JAMES S. HENRY: That's right, and it doesn't include nonfinancial assets, like real estate, yachts, art collections. I mean, the tax angle to this, our estimates are as of 2010. What we've seen since then is that the numbers for the worldwide haven industry have grown even farther, especially from countries like Russia and China, which had been in the last two or three years subject to huge amount of capital outflow – a trillion dollars from China in the last 18 months; Russia probably has more than $1.3 trillion offshore; Argentina, leading Latin American countries have more than $2.5 trillion offshore which is more than twice their external debt. So a lot of this is motivated by taxation, but it's also motivated by political risk, kind of the ruling elite.

But I think what you have to imagine is something like the Star Wars bar scene where you have the drug dealers, the tax dodgers, the corrupticrats, the people worried about being raided by the political police, all gathered around using the same basic facilities which are offshore companies and trusts which are very easy to set up in other people's names, with nominee directors. There was one lady who was a secretary for Fonseca who was listed as a director for 24,000 letter box companies that were set up, all of them owned by nonresidents of Panama. So it's this financial secretive facility – the lack of any registration of so-called beneficial owners – so we don't know who owns what. And I think that's one big contributor to this. But it's also this network of unscrupulous law firms, banks and accounting firms that are channeling all this business to these people and the public officials that have failed for 40 years to crack down on this.

BETWEEN THE LINES: Well, just a final quick one here. What would be the top actions you would like to see the U.S. government take in coalition with other governments around the world to close off these tax loopholes and make the playing field more even for all taxpayers?

JAMES S. HENRY: An international commission with subpoena power like what they have in Guatemala, I'd like to have beneficial ownership registration on a public register so we tell who owns what. I'd like to have public officials have to release their tax returns and declare their offshore and onshore wealth. And I'd like to have tougher penalties for the banks and other enablers that are in this business and I'd like to have a blacklist for havens that keep getting caught doing this over and over again, like Panama and to some extent like Delaware.

For more information visit "The Panama Papers: Politicians, Criminals and the Rogue Industry that Hides Their Cash," at panamapapers.icij.org/; the tax justice network at taxjustice.net; Columbia University's Center for Sustainable International Investment at ccsi.columbia.edu.