For more than 10 years, ICIJ has built a name for itself as one of the premiere investigative news outlets uncovering the shadowy world of tax havens and financial secrecy.

Inspired by ICIJ’s work, French news magazine XXI has planned a special edition focused on this $10 trillion industry, which will include interviews with advocates and experts like renowned economist Gabriel Zucman, as well as special investigative reports on tax havens like the United States, Dubai and Monaco and issues like money laundering, Russian oligarchs, and the trade in luxury goods.

In addition to its standard edition, XXI is also crowdfunding an English-language version of the magazine that can be pre-ordered via Kickstarter.

In a Q&A with ICIJ, XXI managing editor David Serenay shares the motivations driving this edition of the magazine, and some of the surprises he found while compiling the stories.

What made you decide on a special edition focused on tax havens and offshore finance?

It has been now several decades that a lot of civil actors have been very critical about tax havens. Members of Parliament, judges, journalists: all of them pointed out the fact that the offshore planet is detrimental to our democratic states. A lot of political leaders have said, from time to time that “tax havens are finished.” Those are the exacts words that Nicolas Sarkozy had in a G20 meeting in 2009 when he was President of France. But this is wrong: the offshore system has never been so rich and powerful. It is now estimated to be worth up to $10 trillion, which is the equivalent of combined gross domestic product of Germany, France, Italy and Spain. Economist Gabriel Zucman estimates 8% of all private wealth is handled in tax havens; this is just incredible!

Why should people care about this issue ?

The cover of the XXI tax havens special edition. Image: Supplied

That situation has two very harmful side effects. The first one is a huge loss of tax revenue. According to the Tax Justice Network’s 2021 index, this worldwide loss is estimated at $483 billion. Can you imagine all the hospitals, roads or schools that could be built with those resources? So far, the non-tax haven states are the great losers of the system.

The other problem is the great opacity of the offshore planet, for both the richest individuals and the biggest companies. All of them are free to hide their wealth with little risk or ramifications. The temptation to cheat is very high, and the line between tax optimization and tax evasion is very thin.

Eventually, the offshore world is also used by true criminals: drug cartels, prostitution networks, gambling syndicates and more are very familiar with these tax havens and secrecy jurisdictions, where they find all the facilities for laundering their black money.

XXI says it was inspired by ICIJ for this edition – what role have journalists and whistleblowers played in increasing public attention on this issue?

There are different ways to fight this battle. The first one is law reform, to prohibit some practices and facilitate investigations. For example, the automatic exchange of financial information has been a significant advancement for judges and authorities who investigate financial crime. But this is not enough. You also need to win the battle of public opinion. A lot of people still think that tax evasion should be celebrated. But for ten years, all the leaks (Panama Papers, Paradise Papers, Swiss and Luxemburg Leaks) have shown that those offshore practices are a fertile ground for corruption. Black money is the best way to hide political and financial tricks. And without whistleblowers and international journalism consortiums, who will tell the public the truth about the system?

What has been the most surprising thing that you’ve discovered yourself, in editing this edition?

The first “surprise” of this special issue is the unusual way the arms of law enforcement (judges and police investigators) are criticizing political leaders. Most of those specialists think that current leaders have no willingness to put an end to this system.

The second thing is that there are many solutions to discourage companies and individuals to go on using tax havens. For example, Zucman, the French economist based at UCLA, thinks that Western democratic countries could take initiatives to enforce a minimum taxation for the world companies.

Can you give us a sneak preview – is there one story or interview that just can’t be missed?

I would recommand the interview with former Geneva public prosecutor Bernard Bertossa, who has very strong words on the Swiss authorities. And there is also a very instructive report and a comic-story on the yachting industry for the ultra-wealthy, where you will discover how the Russian oligarchs, for example, launder money by buying those luxurious, excessive boats, all around the world!

Elon Musk looks down during a speech.

Jim Watson/AFP via Getty Images

• The Washington Post found the man who encountered Elon Musk’s security at a Los Angeles gas station.
• Brandon Collado claimed that Musk knew his location at all times and was “stalking him.” 
• He also believed that Musk’s former partner, Grimes, was trying to communicate with him.

The man who allegedly confronted a car carrying Elon Musk’s son was an Uber Eats driver who believed he was connected to the billionaire’s ex-girlfriend, Grimes, according to The Washington Post, but police say they have found no evidence so far to support the idea the incident occurred as a result of accounts that track Musk’s private jet.

On Wednesday, Musk tweeted a video that showed one of his security guards moving toward a man in a vehicle and filming the license plate of the man’s car. Musk claimed the man in the car had blocked and jumped onto the hood of a car carrying his son, X Æ A-Xii.

The video does not show the events prior to the confrontation.

“Last night, car carrying lil X in LA was followed by crazy stalker (thinking it was me), who later blocked car from moving & climbed onto hood,” Musk wrote in a tweet.

—Elon Musk (@elonmusk) December 15, 2022

 

At the same time, Musk began speaking out against people like 20-year-old Jack Sweeney, who runs multiple private jet tracker accounts, including one that tracks Musk’s jet. The accounts use publicly available data to follow the flight paths of private jets that belong to celebrities.

On Wednesday, Twitter moved to ban such accounts and links to them on other platforms and began suspending journalists who Musk claimed “doxxed” him for posting Tweets related to his flights — although some of the people blocked said they never shared such info. Musk compared the posts to sharing “assassination coordinates.”

“Legal action is being taken against Sweeney & organizations who supported harm to my family,” Musk wrote. 

According to the Post report published Sunday, the incident occurred at a gas station in South Pasadena on Tuesday evening — 23 hours after the @ElonJet account last shared Musk’s location at Los Angeles International Airport. The incident occurred 26 miles away from LAX, the Post reported.

The Post identified the man in the video Musk shared on Twitter as Brandon Collado, an Uber Eats driver who was aware that Grimes, Musk’s former girlfriend and mother of two of his kids — real name Claire Elise Boucher — lived nearby the gas station where the incident occurred. Collado rented the vehicle he was in, the Post reported.

Collado made strange claims to the Post, saying Grimes was discreetly communicating with him through Instagram posts and that Musk was able to prevent him from receiving Uber Eats orders, claiming Musk controlled the company. Collado also claimed Musk knew his location at all times, and, following the incident, accused Musk of “stalking” his family in a tweet directed at Musk, the Post reported.

Collado told the Post that he arrived at the gas station while making deliveries and to visit a friend. In videos obtained by the Post from Collado himself, Collado can be seen walking in front of a car driven by Musk’s security guard. There is no information to confirm whether or not Musk’s son was in the car, the Post reported.

The gas station manager told the Post that the South Pasadena Police Department responded to the incident. The Los Angeles Police Department wrote in a statement that Musk has yet to file a police report regarding the incident, multiple outlets have reported. 

Marc Madero, an LAPD detective, told the Post his unit is investigating whether or not Collado is a suspect they had been investigating for stalking Boucher, and say Collado may have purposely taken steps to conceal his identity. 

Madero said that although his unit has not obtained proof that Collado used jet tracking to locate Musk’s security guards, it could be a possibility.

The LAPD, SPPD, and Musk did not immediately respond to Insider’s request for comment.

Using a low-profile fleet of ships under U.S. sanctions, Syria has this year sharply increased wheat imports from the Black Sea peninsula of Crimea that Russia annexed from Ukraine, a sign of tightening economic ties between two allies shunned by the West.

Wheat sent to Syria from the Black Sea port of Sevastopol in Crimea increased 17-fold this year to just over 500,000 tonnes, previously unreported Refinitiv shipping data shows, to make up nearly a third of the country’s total imports of the grain.

With sanctions making it more complicated for Syria and Russia to trade using mainstream sea transport and marine insurance, the two countries are increasingly relying on their own ships to move the grain, including three Syrian vessels that are subject to sanctions imposed by Washington, the data shows.

Russia annexed Crimea in 2014. Russian forces invaded more of Ukraine on Feb. 24 and despite military setbacks they still control a swathe of the country’s agricultural heartlands of Kherson and Zaporizhzhia.

Both Ukraine and the Russia-installed authorities agree that some grain has been exported from occupied Zaporizhzhia via Crimea. Ukraine though says grain was stolen by the occupiers, a charge Russia denies.

Ukraine says at least a part of the grain that passed through Sevastopol was taken from Ukrainian territories after Russia invaded. Ukraine’s embassy in Beirut, which has been tracking shipments coming to Syria, estimates that 500,000 tonnes of what it calls plundered Ukrainian grain has arrived in Syria since the invasion, shipped from several ports.

The embassy said these calculations and Ukrainian authorities’ allegation that grain was stolen was based on information from field and silo owners in occupied territories, satellite data of truck movements to ports and the tracking of ships.

Russia’s agriculture and foreign ministries did not immediately respond to requests for comment for this story. In May, Kremlin spokesman Dmitry Peskov described as “fake” the allegations Russia has stolen grain during what it calls its special military operation in Ukraine.

Reuters could not independently verify the origin of the wheat being shipped from Crimea or whether the farmers and traders who handled it were paid.

Yevgeny Balitsky, the Moscow-appointed governor of the Russian-occupied part of the Zaporizhzhia region said in June that Crimean ports had been used to export grain from Zaporizhzhia. However, he said farmers would be paid via a company set up by his administration, Russia’s Interfax news agency reported.

Additionally, Crimea’s Russia-installed administration said 1.4 million tonnes of wheat by bunker weight were harvested from Crimea’s own fields, in comments on social media in August.

Ukraine disputes these figures, saying Crimea does not produce nearly that much.

“The so-called ‘Crimean harvest’ includes grain exported from the territory of mainland Ukraine,” the Ukrainian agriculture ministry said in a statement in response to Reuters’ questions.

Prior to the current war, Syria had imported grain from Crimea on previous occasions since Russia took control of the peninsula, Reuters reported.

According to the Refinitiv data, Syria imported about 501,800 tonnes of wheat from Sevastopol this year until the end of November, up from about 28,200 tonnes in the whole of 2021.

Shipments picked up from May onwards with the largest monthly consignment of 78,600 tonnes in October, according to the data, which is collated from port inspection reports provided by port operators.

Increasingly, Syria is relying on a fleet of its own cargo ships or Russian-flagged ships to bring in food via government-to-government deals that eschew the usual tender and charter process for moving commodities by sea.

Analysis from maritime and commodities data platform Shipfix showed the number of cargo orders – global requests for available ships to transport grains – to Syria fell by two thirds to 54 in the year to Nov. 30 versus the whole of 2021.

Instead, the wheat cargoes are typically moving to Syria’s Latakia and Tartus ports on three Syrian ships, according to two grain trade sources familiar with the journey, the Ukrainian embassy in Beirut, other Ukrainian diplomats, and an analysis from Shipfix.

The ships – the Laodicea, the Finikia and the Souria – are owned by the state-owned Syrian General Authority for Maritime Transport, according to Equasis and the U.S. Treasury. All three have been sanctioned since 2015 by the United States for their alleged role in the conflict in Syria over the last decade.

Ships that have been designated are typically less well maintained and older due to prohibitions on accessing top tier insurance and certification services. They are able to operate more easily between countries also under sanctions, a possible explanation for the rising trade between the two allies.

Russia has repeatedly complained that the sanctions imposed on it this year have limited its ability to ship grains to countries across Africa and the Arab world that rely on its produce to feed their people.

The thicket of Western sanctions on Syria and Russia don’t formally target food but can in practice complicate such trade, in part because they make it difficult for some grain-trading houses to do business with them, especially due to financing constraints.

Syrian maritime authorities did not respond to Reuters requests for comment about the vessels.

Some shipments also arrived on Russian-flagged vessels, including the Mikhail Nenashev, Matros Pozynich and Matros Koshka, which Equasis, a shipping database, shows are owned by a subsidiary of a Russian state-owned company called United Shipbuilding Corporation.

Washington, the European Union and Britain imposed sanctions on the United Shipbuilding Corporation in April after the Russian invasion.

United Shipbuilding Corporation did not respond to a request for comment.

Syrian President Bashar al-Assad’s government began to rely on grain imports when the country’s civil war dealt a blow to domestic harvests that once produced enough for the country’s staple of subsidised flat bread as well as surpluses for export. More recently, drought has made the crop even smaller.

Russia has backed Syria’s government for decades and since 2015 helped Assad’s troops recapture most of the country from opposition fighters.

The sanctions and more than a decade of conflict mean Syria is also short of cash, potentially making Russia’s relatively cheaper wheat attractive.

During a visit to Crimea in January, Syria’s economy minister said his country needed 1.5 million tonnes of wheat imports, with Russia providing the majority.

Actual imports will be close to that, according to one trade source familiar with Syria’s grain purchases who said the harvest this year was the worst in Syria’s history.

Refinitiv data shows all but a fraction of the imports were from Russia and territory it controls, unlike previous years, when Syria augmented supplies with purchases from other countries including Romania.

The first grain trade source said at least one million tonnes of grain imports from Russia during 2021 and 2022 had been financed through a line of credit extended by Moscow to Damascus. Last year, Russia’s deputy prime minister said Moscow had provided a loan to Syria in part for food.

Syrian government officials and the state grains agency Hoboob did not respond to requests for information for this story. Russian authorities have not disclosed grain supplies to Syria for a number of years.

European Union unity over sanctions on Russia has started to falter as jitters about the impact on Europe’s own stumbling economy weakens resolve to punish Moscow for war in Ukraine.

EU leaders agreed on Thursday to a ninth package of sanctions but talks were acrimonious, with Poland and the Baltic states that neighbour Russia campaigning for tougher measures, while states further west, such as Germany, were more hesitant.

Some, such as Belgium and Greece, as well as Hungary which still relies heavily on Russian energy imports, pushed back against further sweeping measures, EU diplomats told Reuters.

“It is becoming increasingly difficult to impose sanctions that hit Russia hard enough, without excessive collateral damage to the EU,” a spokesperson for Belgium’s government said ahead of the deal at the EU leaders’ summit.

After Russia invaded Ukraine in February, starting the biggest conflict in Europe since World War Two, the European Union showed a united front and responded with swift steps against Russia, unusual for the 27-nation bloc where opposing voices often turn debates into marathon meetings.

Sanctions have already been imposed on a range of companies and Russian individuals, while overflights by Russian planes have been banned and business with several Russian banks barred.

But finding common ground now has become tougher.

After this week’s talks, Lithuanian Foreign Minister Gabrielius Landsbergis described the latest sanctions deal as a “missed opportunity”, saying he was disappointing that EU states spent more time discussing exemptions than tougher steps.

The latest measures targeted entities connected to Russia’s military, clamped down on drones and froze assets of two Russian banks among other curbs.

But strains were felt during talks. Lithuania and others objected to moves to secure carve outs to exempt a handful of Russian oligarchs involved with agriculture and fertilisers, although that dispute was defused in the end, sources said.

Poland and the Baltic states, closer to the frontline, circulated a proposal in recent weeks for more far-reaching sanctions, including on Russian gas and its nuclear industry, and arguing against exemptions, such as on sales of Russian steel and diamonds.

Some in that group want Gazprombank, central for energy payments to Russia, to be targeted, said one person familiar with the matter. The person said many countries were reluctant but added these issues would be discussed in 2023.

For some European politicians, such as those from Poland which faces fighting on its doorstep, the hesitancy of other states to support sterner steps has proved frustrating.

“We will demand Germany change its policy. It’s not fair for Germany to rely on Poland to defend it from the threat of war,” said Radosław Sikorski, Poland’s former foreign minister and now a member of the European Parliament. “Just because you are richer and bigger doesn’t mean you are always right.”

Russia says sanctions have boomeranged against the West, driving up inflation as energy prices have rocketed higher. Moscow says its own economy is resilient.

Meanwhile, existing EU measures are not always watertight. The EU imposed a price cap on seaborne Russian oil deliveries, but its crude is selling below that level, so revenues still flow to Moscow.

The cap was billed as further punishment for Russia but some officials say the main impact is to water down the bloc’s own curbs on the oil trade as, provided the price stays below the cap, European insurers can underwrite Russian shipments.

The oil cap – designed to align the whole of the EU with the United States – was adjusted in a nod to Greece and Cyprus, which have large tanker fleets, people familiar with the matter said.

European diplomats and officials, speaking during this week’s talks, told Reuters the bloc was nearing its limits.

“Now we are careful with sanctions, so that we don’t go so far that we would totally damage the European economy,” said Edita Hrda, the ambassador to the European Union of the Czech Republic, which holds the EU presidency.

“If we push certain steps against Russia, it could cost some political leaders their jobs. We need to give the countries time to adjust. We need a prosperous Europe in order to help Ukraine,” said Hrda, who chaired meetings of EU countries, including those that set the shape of the most recent sanctions.

Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orban campaigned at home against sanctions, using posters showing such punitive measures as bombs destroying Hungary’s economy.

Others are more discrete, while some have half an eye on a future relationship with Russia after the war ends.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz said this month that the EU would “tighten the sanctions against Russia for as long as Putin continues his war”.

He has also said relations were now “being reduced, reduced, reduced” but there should be an opportunity for economic cooperation again for “a Russia that ends the war”.

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Five victims and one suspect are dead following a shooting at a condominium in Canada’s Vaughan city, just north of Toronto, the York Regional Police department said.

Another victim is hospitalized in a serious condition, police said in a statement early on Monday.

The police were called to a residential building located on Jane Street, north of Rutherford Road, on Sunday evening for a report of an “active male shooter who had shot several victims.”

The suspect was shot after an interaction with police and pronounced deceased at the scene, according to the police.

An investigation is active and ongoing, the police said in the statement, adding that there is no further threat to public safety.

Details on the motive were not immediately provided.

For nearly two years the United States has tried and failed to negotiate a revival of the 2015 Iran nuclear deal yet Washington and its European allies refuse to close the door to diplomacy.

Their reasons reflect the danger of alternative approaches, the unpredictable consequences of a military strike on Iran, and the belief that there is still time to alter Tehran’s course: even if it is inching toward making fissile material it is not there yet, nor has it mastered the technology to build a bomb, according to officials.

“I think that we do not have a better option than the JCPOA to ensure that Iran does not develop nuclear weapons,” Josep Borrell, the European Union’s foreign policy chief, said last week in Brussels after a meeting of EU officials. Under the 2015 Joint Comprehensive Plan of Action under which Tehran reined in its nuclear program in return for relief from economic sanctions.

“We have to continue engaging as much as possible in trying to revive this deal.”

The uphill climb to revive the pact has grown steeper this year. Iran has brutally cracked down on popular protests, Iranian drones have allegedly made their way to aid Russia’s war in Ukraine and Tehran has accelerated its nuclear program, all of which raise the political price to giving Iran sanctions relief.

“Every day you see more and more pundits saying this is the worst time for reviving the deal and we should just be putting pressure on the wretched regime there,” said Robert Einhorn, a nonproliferation expert at the Brookings Institution think tank.

“There is a kind of resignation, even among the strong proponents of revival. Their hearts would be for paying the political price for a revival, but their heads tell them it would be really tough,” he added.

In 2018 former U.S. President Donald Trump reneged on the 2015 deal that, in a key provision, limited Tehran’s enrichment of uranium to a purity of 3.67%, far below the 90% considered bomb grade.

Trump reimposed U.S. sanctions on Iran, leading Tehran to resume previously banned nuclear work and reviving U.S., European and Israeli fears that Iran may seek an atomic bomb. Iran denies any such ambition.

Iran is now enriching uranium to 60%, including at Fordow, a site buried under a mountain, making it harder to destroy through bombardment.

Obtaining fissile material is considered the greatest obstacle to making a nuclear weapon but there are others, notably the technical challenge of designing a bomb.

A U.S. intelligence estimate disclosed in late 2007 assessed with high confidence that Iran was working to develop nuclear weapons until the fall of 2003, when it halted the weapons work.

Diplomats said they believed Iran had not begun enriching to 90%, which they said they viewed as a red line.

“If Iran were to clearly restart its military program and enrich at 90% then the entire debate changes in the United States, Europe and Israel,” said a Western diplomat, saying the diplomatic path would remain open unless that happened.
U.S. politicians have grown more hostile to cutting a deal because of Iran’s ruthless crackdown on protests that began after a 22-year-old Kurdish Iranian woman, Mahsa Amini, died in September in the custody of Iran’s morality police.

U.S. President Joe Biden’s administration has intensified sanctions against Iran in recent months, targeting Chinese entities facilitating sales of Iranian crude and penalizing Iranian officials for human rights abuses.

Still, even though negotiations are stalled Enrique Mora, the European diplomat who coordinates the nuclear talks, “keeps talking to all sides,” said a senior Biden administration official who spoke on condition of anonymity.

“We will continue with the pressure while keeping the door open for a return to diplomacy,” U.S. special envoy for Iran Robert Malley told reporters in Paris last month, adding that if Iran crossed “a new threshold in its nuclear program, obviously the response will be different.” He did not elaborate.

Iran has linked a revival of the deal to the closure of investigations by the International Atomic Energy Agency (IAEA) into uranium traces at three sites. The United States and its allies have not agreed to that condition.

Several Western diplomats said they did not believe there was any imminent consideration of military action against Iran and suggested a strike could simply reinforce any Iranian desire to obtain nuclear weapons and risk Iranian retaliation.

“I do not think … anybody is envisaging a military option in the near-term,” said the Western diplomat. “The solution isn’t going to be military and I don’t hear a lot of people calling for one.”

A third diplomat said he thought it practically impossible for Israel to bomb Iran without Western support.

Even if the 2015 nuclear deal cannot be resurrected, the senior Biden administration official said other diplomatic solutions might be possible.

“Whether, when and how the JCPOA can be revived is a difficult question,” he said. “But even if, at some point, the JCPOA were to die, that would not mean that diplomacy would be buried at the same time.”

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Donald Trump speaks during a rally at the Dayton International Airport on November 7, 2022 in Vandalia, Ohio.

Drew Angerer/Getty Images

• Outgoing GOP Sen. Pat Toomey says Trump’s influence over the Republican Party is waning.
• Toomey attributed Trump’s weakened influence to the GOP’s bad midterm performance. 
• Toomey also said it might have to do with Trump’s “unbelievably terrible” 2024 campaign rollout.

Outgoing Sen. Pat Toomey says former President Donald Trump’s hold on the Republican Party is finally waning. 

“The election outcome from last month I think dramatically accelerates the waning. And frankly, his unbelievably terrible rollout of his election campaign is also not helping him,” Toomey said on CNN on Sunday. 

The outgoing Republican senator added that he thought Trump’s influence was already declining, albeit “not as quickly” as he hoped it would. He added that it is a sign of Trump’s weakness that other Republican candidates are expressing an intention to run even after Trump announced his campaign. 

Arkansas Gov. Asa Hutchinson, for one, has expressed interest in a presidential bid of his own. 

—CNN (@CNN) December 18, 2022

 

“In my travels after the election around Pennsylvania, I’ve heard from many, many formerly very pro-Trump voters that they think it’s time for our party to move on,” Toomey said. 

Toomey also called Trump out during his Senate farewell speech on December 15, warning his GOP colleagues that the party “can’t be about or beholden to any one man.” 

“We’re much bigger than that. Our party is much bigger than that,” Toomey said. 

“And I hope we resist the temptation to adopt the protectionist nativist isolationist redistributive policies that some are suggesting we embrace,” he added.

Trump’s losing friends and allies after announcing his 2024 bid

Ever since announcing his 2024 campaign in November, Trump has raged against Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, a popular, would-be rival in the next election.

He launched a sale of non-fungible tokens which were even mocked by Trump loyalist Steve Bannon. However, Trump might not be doing so badly for himself — Coin Desk reported on Friday that the 45,000 cards were already sold on that day, and may have raked in over a million dollars for Trump. 

Toomey made the comments on the same day that former GOP congressman Carlos Curbelo told MSNBC he thinks Trump is in “deep trouble” due to a potential criminal referral from the House Select Committee for the Justice Department to prosecute Trump over the Capitol riot.

The January 6 panel is set to vote on the referral on Monday, per NPR. 

“Donald Trump is in deep trouble. I don’t think anything can rescue him. I do think that he can use these criminal referrals as a way to rally his base, but the end is near for Donald Trump,” Curbelo told MSNBC. “His next bankruptcy is looming, you can see it coming on the horizon, and I don’t even think this would save him.”

Representatives for Toomey and Trump did not immediately respond to Insider’s request for comment.