Pandora Papers: Expose offshore business and hidden wealth of world and billionaire leaders

Millions of leaked documents and the largest journalistic association in history have uncovered financial secrets of 35 current and former world leaders, more than 330 politicians and public officials in 91 countries and territories, and a global list of fugitives, con artists and assassins.

Secret documents expose the offshore dealings of the King of Jordan, the presidents of Ukraine, Kenya and Ecuador, the Prime Minister of the Czech Republic and former British Prime Minister Tony Blair. The files also detail the financial activities of Russian President Vladimir Putin's "unofficial propaganda minister" and more than 130 billionaires from Russia, the United States, Turkey and other nations.

Leaked records reveal that many of the power players who could help bring an end to the offshore system are instead profiting from it: hiding assets in shell companies and trusts while their governments do little to stem a global flow of illicit money that enriches criminals and impoverishes nations.

Among the hidden treasures revealed in the documents:

The secret records are known as the Pandora Papers.

The International Consortium of Investigative Journalists obtained the trove of more than 11.9 million sensitive files and led a team of more than 600 journalists from 150 news outlets who spent two years sifting through them, trawling down hard-to-find sources and searching for in court records. and other public documents from dozens of countries.

The leaked records come from 14 offshore service companies from around the world that have set up shell companies and other offshore corners for clients who often seek to keep their financial activities in the shadows. The records include information on the dealings of nearly three times as many current and former country leaders as any previous leak of documents from coastal havens.

In an era of rising authoritarianism and inequality, the Pandora Papers investigation offers an unparalleled perspective on how money and power operate in the 21st century, and how the rule of law has bent and broken around the world for a system of financial secrecy enabled by the United States and other wealthy nations.

The findings from ICIJ and its media partners highlight how deeply secret finance has infiltrated global politics, and offer insight into why governments and global organizations have made little progress in ending financial abuses in the world. foreign.

An ICIJ analysis of the secret documents identified 956 companies in offshore havens linked to 336 politicians and high-level public officials, including country leaders, cabinet ministers, ambassadors and others. More than two-thirds of those companies have established themselves in the British Virgin Islands, a jurisdiction long known as a key cog in the offshore system.

At least $11.3 trillion is kept "offshore," according to a 2020 study by the Paris-based Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development. Due to the complexity and secrecy of the offshore system, it is not possible to know how much of that wealth is linked to tax evasion and other crimes and how much of it involves funds that come from legitimate sources and have been reported to the appropriate authorities.

Every Corner of the World

The Pandora Papers investigation unmasks the covert owners of offshore companies, shadow bank accounts, private jets, yachts, mansions and even works of art by Picasso, Banksy and others teachers, providing more information than is generally available to cash-strapped governments and law enforcement agencies.

People linked by the secret documents to overseas assets include Indian cricket superstar Sachin Tendulkar, pop diva Shakira, supermodel Claudia Schiffer and an Italian mobster known as "Lell the Fat One" .

The mobster, Raffaele Amato, has been linked to at least a dozen murders. The documents provide details about a UK-registered shell company that Amato used to buy land in Spain shortly before fleeing Italy to set up his own criminal gang. Amato, whose story helped inspire the highly praised film "Gomorrah," is serving a 20-year prison sentence.

Amato's attorney did not respond to ICIJ's request for comment.

Tendulkar's lawyer said the cricketer's investment is legitimate and has been declared to tax authorities. Shakira's lawyer said that the singer declared her companies, which according to the lawyer do not offer tax advantages. Schiffer's representatives said the supermodel correctly pays her taxes in the UK, where she lives.

In most countries, it is not illegal to have assets abroad or use shell companies to do business across national borders. Entrepreneurs who operate internationally say they need offshore companies to conduct their financial affairs.

But these issues often amount to shifting profits from high-tax countries, where they are made, to companies that exist only on paper in low-tax jurisdictions. The use of safe havens at sea is especially controversial for political figures, because they can be used to keep politically unpopular or even illegal activities out of public view.

In the popular imagination, the coastal system is often seen as a remote group of islands shaded by palm trees. The Pandora Papers show that the foreign money-making machine operates in every corner of the globe, including the world's largest democracies. Key players in the system include elite institutions (multinational banks, law firms, and accounting practices) based in the US and Europe.

A Pandora Papers document shows that banks around the world helped their clients set up at least 3,926 offshore companies with the assistance of Aleman, Cordero, Galindo & Lee, a Panamanian law firm run by a former ambassador to the United States. the firm, also known as Alcogal, established at least 312 companies in the British Virgin Islands for clients of US financial services giant Morgan Stanley.

A Morgan Stanley spokesman said: "We do not create offshore companies... This process is independent of the firm and is at the discretion and direction of the client."

The Pandora Papers investigation also highlights how Baker McKenzie, the largest law firm in the US, helped create the modern offshore system and remains a mainstay of this underground economy.

Baker McKenzie and its global affiliates have used their expertise in lobbying and drafting legislation to shape financial law around the world. They have also benefited from work done for people linked to fraud and corruption, the ICIJ has found.

Among those the company has worked for is Ukrainian oligarch Ihor Kolomoisky, who US authorities allege laundered $5.5 billion through a web of shell companies, buying up factories and commercial property all over the world. the heart of America.

Baker McKenzie also worked for Jho Low, a financier now on the run accused by authorities in several countries of masterminding the embezzlement of more than $4.5 billion from a Malaysian economic development fund known as 1MDB. ICIJ reports found that Low relied on Baker McKenzie and its affiliates to help him and his associates build a network of companies in Malaysia and Hong Kong. US authorities allege that they used some of those companies to transfer money stolen from 1MDB.

A Baker McKenzie spokesperson said the firm seeks to provide the best advice to its clients and strives to "ensure that our clients comply with both the law and best practices."

The spokesman did not directly address many questions about Baker McKenzie's role in the offshore economy, citing client confidentiality and legal privilege. But he said the firm runs strict background checks on all potential clients.

'You Know Who'

The Pandora Papers investigation is bigger and more global than ICIJ's landmark Panama Papers investigation, which rocked the world in 2016, sparking police raids and new laws in dozens of countries and the fall of prime ministers in Iceland and Pakistan.

The Panama Papers come from the files of a single offshore service provider: the Panamanian law firm Mossack Fonseca. The Pandora documents shed light on a much broader cross-section of lawyers and intermediaries who are at the heart of the offshore industry.

The Pandora documents provide more than twice the information on ownership of offshore companies. In total, the new document leak reveals the true owners of more than 29,000 offshore companies. Owners hail from more than 200 countries and territories, with the largest contingents from Russia, the United Kingdom, Argentina and China.

In 2017, the king bought a $23 million property overlooking a California surf beach through a company in the BVI. The king paid more to have another BVI company, owned by his Swiss wealth managers, act as "nominee" director of the BVI company that bought the property.

In the offshore world, nominee directors are people or companies who are paid to stand up to whoever is actually behind a company. Application forms sent to clients by Alcogal, the law firm working on behalf of the king, say that the use of nominee directors helps “preserve privacy by avoiding the identity of the principal. . . be publicly accessible."

In the emails, offshore advisers used a code name for the king: "You know who."

Lawyers for the king in the UK said he is not required to pay tax under Jordanian law and has security and privacy reasons to hold the property through offshore companies. They said that the king has never wasted public funds.

The lawyers also said that most of the companies and properties identified by ICIJ have no connection to the king or no longer exist, but declined to provide details.

Experts say that, as ruler of one of the poorest and most aid-dependent countries in the Middle East, the king has reason to avoid flaunting his wealth.

“If the Jordanian monarch were to display his wealth more publicly, he would not only antagonize his people, but it would anger Western donors who have given him money,” Annelle Sheline, senior Middle East political authority expert, told ICIJ . .

In neighboring Lebanon, where similar questions of wealth and poverty have been raised, the Pandora Papers show that major political and financial figures have also embraced tax havens.

They include the current prime minister, Najib Mikati, and his predecessor, Hassan Diab, as well as Riad Salameh, the governor of Lebanon's central bank, who is under investigation in France for alleged money laundering.

Marwan Kheireddine, former Lebanese state minister and president of Al Mawarid Bank, also appears in the secret files. In 2019, he scolded former fellow parliamentarians for their inaction amid a dire economic crisis. Half the population lived in poverty, struggling to find food while grocery stores and bakeries closed.

“There is tax evasion and the government needs to address that,” Kheireddine said.

That same year, the Pandora papers reveal, Kheireddine signed on as the owner of a British Virgin Islands company that owns a $2 million yacht.

Al Mawarid Bank was one of many in the country that restricted customer withdrawals of US dollars to stem the economic panic.

Wafaa Abou Hamdan, a 57-year-old widow, is among the regular Lebanese who remain angry with their country's elites. Due to runaway inflation, her life savings plummeted from the equivalent of $60,000 to less than $5,000, she told Daraj, an ICIJ media partner.

“All the efforts of my life were in vain. I have been working continuously for the last three decades,” she said. "We continue to fight daily to maintain our lives," while "politicians and bankers" have "transferred and invested their money abroad."

Kheireddine and Diab did not respond to requests for comment. In a written response, Salameh said that he declares his assets and has complied with reporting obligations under Lebanese law. Mikati's son, Maher, said it is common for people in Lebanon to use offshore companies "because of the easy incorporation process" rather than a desire to evade taxes.

‘Coalition of the corrupt’

Imran Khan was elated when the ICIJ Panama Papers investigation came to light in April 2016.

“Leaks are God-sent,” said the Pakistani politician and former cricket superstar.

The Panama Papers revealed that the sons of Pakistan's prime minister at the time, Nawaz Sharif, had ties to offshore companies. This gave Khan an opportunity to criticize Sharif, his political rival, in what Khan described as the "coalition of the corrupt" ravaging Pakistan.

“It is disgusting the way money is looted in the developing world from people who are already deprived of basic services: health, education, justice and jobs,” Khan told ICIJ partner The Guardian in 2016. “This money is placed in foreign accounts, or even Western countries, Western banks. The poor get poorer. Poor countries get poorer and rich countries get richer. Offshore accounts protect these criminals.”

Ultimately, Pakistan's highest court removed Sharif from his post as a result of an investigation launched by the Panama Papers. Khan swept in to replace him in the upcoming national election.

ICIJ's latest investigation, the Pandora Papers, draws renewed attention to the use of offshore companies by Pakistani political actors. This time, the overseas holdings of people close to Khan are being revealed, including his finance minister and a major financial backer.

The documents also show that Khan's water resources minister, Chaudhry Moonis Elahi, contacted Asiaciti, a Singapore-based offshore services provider, in 2016 to set up a trust to invest the proceeds of a deal. family land that had been financed by what the lender later. claimed it was an illegal loan. The bank told Pakistani authorities that the loan had been approved due to the influence of Elahi's father, a former deputy prime minister.

Asiaciti records say Elahi refrained from putting money into a trust in Singapore after the provider told him it would report the details to Pakistani tax authorities.

Elahi did not respond to ICIJ's requests for comment. Hours before the release of the Pandora Papers stories, a family spokesperson told ICIJ media partners that "misleading data and interpretations have been circulated in the files for nefarious reasons." The spokesperson added that the family's assets "are declared in accordance with applicable law."

Also today, a spokesman for Khan told a news conference that if any of his ministers or advisers had offshore companies, "they will be held accountable."

Other political figures have also spoken out against the offshore system while surrounded by appointees and other supporters who have assets stored offshore. Some of those who have spoken have used the system themselves.

"The assets of every public servant must be declared publicly so that people can question and ask: what is legitimate?" Kenyan President Uhuru Kenyatta told the BBC in 2018: "If it can't be explained, including myself, then I have a case to answer."

Leaked records list Kenyatta and her mother as beneficiaries of a secret foundation in Panama. Other family members, including her brother and two of her sisters, own five offshore companies with assets worth more than $30 million, records show.

Kenyatta and his family did not respond to requests for comment.

Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis, one of the richest men in his country, came to power vowing to crack down on tax evasion and corruption. In 2011, as he became more involved in politics, Babis told voters that he wanted to create a country "where entrepreneurs do business and are happy to pay taxes."

Leaked records show that, in 2009, Babis pumped $22 million into a series of shell companies to buy a sprawling property, known as Chateau Bigaud, in a hilltop village in Mougins, France, near Cannes.

Babis has not disclosed the shell companies and the castle in the asset declarations he is required to file as a public official, according to documents obtained by ICIJ's Czech partner Investigace.cz. In 2018, a real estate conglomerate indirectly owned by Babis quietly bought the Monaco company that owns the chateau.

Babis did not respond to requests for comment.

A spokesman for the conglomerate told ICIJ that it complies with the law. He did not respond to questions about the acquisition of the castle.

"Like any other business entity, we have the right to protect our trade secrets," the spokesperson wrote.

‘A scam haven’

The secret files provide a layer of behind-the-curtain context for this year's public pronouncements on offshore wealth and havens, as governments around the world battle falling revenues, a pandemic, climate change and public mistrust.

In February, a commentary from the Tony Blair Institute for Global Change urged lawmakers to seek, among other measures, higher land and house taxes. Blair, the institute's founder and chief executive, spoke about how the wealthy and well-connected have evaded paying their share of taxes since 1994, when he campaigned to become UK Labor Party leader.

"For those who can employ the right accountants, the tax system is a haven of swindle, profit...and profit," he said during a speech in England's West Midlands. “We should not make our fiscal rules a playground for…. tax abusers who pay little or nothing while others pay more than their fair share.”

The Pandora Papers show that in 2017, Blair and his wife, Cherie, became owners of an $8.8 million Victorian building by acquiring the British Virgin Islands company that owned the property. The London building now houses the law firm of Cherie Blair.

Records indicate that Cherie Blair and her husband, who served as a diplomat in the Middle East after stepping down as prime minister in 2007, bought the offshore company that owns the building from the family of the tourism and industry minister of Bahrain, Zayed bin Rashid al. -Zayani.

By purchasing the company's shares instead of the building, the Blairs benefited from a legal settlement that saved them from having to pay more than $400,000 in property taxes.

The Blairs and the al-Zayanis said they did not initially know about each other's involvement in the deal.

Cherie Blair said her husband was not involved in the transaction and that its purpose was "to bring the company and building back into the UK tax and regulatory regime."

She also said that she "did not want to own a British Virgin Islands company" and that the "seller for his own purposes only wanted to sell the company." The company is already closed.

Through their lawyer, the al-Zayanis said their companies "have complied with all UK laws past and present."

“These are loopholes that are available to wealthy people but not available to others,” Robert Palmer, chief executive of Tax Justice UK, told The Guardian. "Politicians need to fix the tax system so everyone pays their fair share."

In June, Brazil's Economy Minister Paulo Guedes proposed a tax reform package that included a 30% tax on profits made through offshore entities. Experts estimate that the richest people in Brazil have almost $200 billion in tax-free funds outside the country.

“You can't be ashamed of being rich,” Guedes said. "You have to be ashamed of not paying taxes."

After bankers and business leaders opposed the tax increases in the legislation, Guedes, a former banker millionaire, agreed to eliminate the proposed tax on foreign earnings. Negotiations on the legislation continue.

The Pandora Papers reveal that Guedes created Dreadnoughts International Group in 2014 in the British Virgin Islands.

In response to questions from an ICIJ partner in Brazil, Revista Piauí, a Guedes spokesperson said the minister had disclosed the company to Brazilian authorities. The spokesperson did not respond to a question about removing the offshore tax from the legislation.

‘Pandora’s Box’

In December 2018, The Bahamas enacted legislation that requires companies and certain trusts to declare their true owners in a government registry. The island nation was under pressure from larger countries, including the United States, to do more to block tax evaders and criminals from the financial system.

Some Bahamian politicians opposed the move. They complained that the registration would deter Latin American clients from doing business in the Caribbean. "The winners of these new double standards are the states of Delaware, Alaska and South Dakota," a local lawyer said.

Months later, a confidential document indicated that the family of the former Vice President of the Dominican Republic, Carlos Morales Troncoso, had abandoned the Bahamas as a sanctuary to go to for their wealth.

For their new refuge, they chose a place 1,600 miles away: Sioux Falls, South Dakota.

The family set up trusts in South Dakota, leaked records show, to dispose of various assets, including shares they held in a Dominican sugar company. The family did not respond to questions about the assets moved from the Bahamas to South Dakota.

The Pandora Papers provide details about tens of millions of dollars moving from sea havens in the Caribbean and Europe to South Dakota, a sparsely populated US state that has become a major destination for foreign assets.

Over the past decade, South Dakota, Nevada and more than a dozen other US states have become leaders in the business of trading financial secrets. Meanwhile, most of the policy and enforcement efforts of the world's most powerful nations have focused on "traditional" offshore havens such as the Bahamas, Cayman Islands, and other island havens.

The United States is one of the main players in the offshore world. It is also the country best placed to put an end to offshore financial abuses, thanks to the enormous role it plays in the international banking system. Due to the status of the US dollar as the de facto global currency, most international transactions go in and out of New York-based banking operations.

US authorities have taken steps over the past two decades to force banks in Switzerland and other countries to turn over information about Americans with accounts abroad.

But the United States is more interested in forcing other countries to share information about Americans' banking operations abroad than in sharing information about money moving through American bank accounts, companies, and trusts.

The United States has refused to join a 2014 agreement backed by more than 100 jurisdictions, including the Cayman Islands and Luxembourg, that would require US financial institutions to share information they hold about foreigners' assets.

Year after year in South Dakota, state legislators have passed laws drafted by trust industry experts, providing increasing protections and other benefits for trust clients in the US and abroad. Client assets in South Dakota trusts have more than quadrupled over the past decade to $360 billion.

“As a citizen, I am very sad that my state was the state that opened Pandora's box,” former legislator Susan Wismer told ICIJ.

By 2020, 17 of the world's 20 least restrictive jurisdictions for trusts were US states, according to a study by Israeli academic Adam Hofri-Winogradow. In many cases, he said, US law has made it difficult for creditors to get their hands on what is owed to them, including child support payments from absent parents.

Using documents from the Pandora Papers, ICIJ and The Washington Post identified nearly 30 US-based trusts linked to foreigners personally accused of misconduct or whose companies were accused of wrongdoing.

Among them is Federico Kong Vielman, whose family is one of Guatemala's economic powerhouses.

In 2016, Kong Vielman transferred $13.5 million to a trust in Sioux Falls. Some of the money came from his family business, which makes floor polishes and other products.

Guatemalan media reported for decades on the family's ties to politics. In the 1970s, the family was identified as a key ally of General Carlos Manuel Arana Osorio, the former Guatemalan dictator known as the "Chacal de Zacapa." In 2016, the family's luxury hotel in Guatemala City gave then-President Jimmy Morales 100 free nights. Guatemalan media reported that a possible payment for “political favors” was suspected.

In 2014, US labor officials filed a complaint against the Guatemalan government that included allegations that the family's palm oil company underpaid workers and exposed them to toxic chemicals. Company records show that Kong Vielman was previously the company's treasurer.

A year later, environmental authorities in the United States, which provided technical assistance to Guatemala, discovered that the company was releasing pollutants into the Pasión River. The family business Nacional Agro Industrial SA, known as Naisa, was not charged.

Naisa told the ICIJ that he followed the law and did not pollute the river. The labor complaint was resolved by an arbitration panel, the company said.

Kong Vielman declined to answer questions about the South Dakota trust.

Another wealthy Latin American who has set up trusts in South Dakota is Guillermo Lasso, a banker who was elected president of Ecuador in April. Leaked records show Lasso transferred assets to two trusts in South Dakota in December 2017, three months after Ecuador's parliament passed a law banning public officials from holding assets in tax havens. Records show Lasso transferred two offshore companies to South Dakota trusts from two secretive foundations in Panama.

Lasso said its past use of offshore entities was "legal and legitimate." Lasso said it complies with Ecuadorian law.

Trusts established in South Dakota and many other US states remain shrouded in secrecy, despite the enactment of the federal Corporate Transparency Act this year, which makes it more difficult for owners of certain types of companies hide their identities.

The law is not expected to apply to popular trusts among non-US citizens. Another flagrant exemption, say financial crime experts, is that many lawyers who set up trusts and shell companies are not required to examine the sources of their clients' wealth.

"Clearly, the United States is a big, big loophole in the world," said Yehuda Shaffer, former head of Israel's financial intelligence unit. "The United States is criticizing the rest of the world, but in its own backyard, this is a very, very serious problem."

‘Extraordinary expenses’

Billionaire Erman Ilicak's construction empire had a big year in 2014.

Turkish tycoon Rönesans Holding has finished building a 1,150-room presidential palace for his country's bellicose leader Recep Tayyip Erdoğan amid media rumors about cost overruns and corruption and a court order attempting to stop the project.

Another notable event involving the Ilicak family took place in 2014, this time out of the public eye. The 74-year-old mother of the corporate titan, Ayse Ilicak, became the owner of two offshore companies in the British Virgin Islands, according to Pandora Papers.

Both companies were headed by nominee directors and nominee shareholders. One of the companies, Covar Trading Ltd., held assets from the family's construction conglomerate, records show. During its first full year in operation, Covar Trading earned $105.5 million in dividend income, according to confidential financial statements. The money was kept in a Swiss account.

It didn't last long.

That same year, the filings show, the company paid nearly all of the $105.5 million as a "donation" listed under "extraordinary expenses." The statements do not describe who or what received the money.

Illiack did not respond to questions for this story.

Ilicak and the other Pandora Papers billionaires hail from 45 countries, with the largest numbers from Russia (52), Brazil (15), the UK (13) and Israel (10).

The US billionaires named in the secret documents include two tech moguls, Robert F. Smith and Robert T. Brockman, whose trusts have been the subject of investigations by US authorities. Both were clients of CILTrust, an offshore provider in Belize operated by Glenn Godfrey, a former Belize attorney general.

Smith agreed last year to pay US authorities $139 million to resolve a tax investigation and is cooperating with prosecutors. A US grand jury indicted Brockman, Smith's mentor and financial backer, in what prosecutors called the largest tax fraud in US history.

Smith declined to comment. Brockman pleaded not guilty.

Neither CILTrust nor Godfrey have been accused of wrongdoing. Godfrey did not respond to requests for comment.

A law firm in Cyprus, Nicos Chr. Anastasiades and Partners, is featured in the Pandora Papers as a key overseas middleman for wealthy Russians. The firm retains the name of its founder, Cyprus President Nicos Anastasiades, and the president's two daughters are partners there.

Records show that in 2015, a compliance manager at Panama law firm Alcogal discovered that the Cypriot law firm helped a billionaire and former Russian senator, Leonid Lebedev, hide ownership of four companies by listing the employees of the law firm as owners of the Lebedev entities.

Lebedev, an oil magnate and movie producer with Hollywood connections, fled Russia in 2016 after authorities accused him of embezzling $220 million from an energy company. Lebedev did not respond to requests for comment. The status of the Russian case is unclear.

The Cypriot law firm has also prepared reference letters for Russian steel magnate Alexander Abramov, including one drafted days after the billionaire's name was added by the United States to the list of oligarchs close to President Putin. Abramov did not respond to requests for comment.

Theophanis Philippou, the law firm's managing director, told the BBC, an ICIJ partner, that it has never misled authorities or concealed the identity of a business owner. She declined to comment on the clients, citing attorney-client confidentiality.

Another Russian in the Pandora roles who has ties to Putin is Konstantin Ernst, an Oscar-nominated television executive and producer. He has been called Putin's chief image-maker, a creative talent who sold the nation on the idea that the president is "Russia's strong-willed savior."

The Pandora Papers reveal that Ernst was given the chance to participate in a lucrative opportunity shortly after producing the opening and closing ceremonies of the 2014 Winter Olympics in Sochi, creating a show that boosted Putin's reputation within and out of the country.

Ernst became a silent partner, hidden behind layers of offshore companies, in a state-funded privatization contract, an agreement to buy dozens of movie theaters and other properties in the city of Moscow.

Leaked records show that, by 2019, the value of Ernst's personal stake in the real estate holdings exceeded $140 million.

Ernst told ICIJ that he has "never hidden" his involvement in the privatization deal, and that the deal was not compensation for his work during the 2014 Olympics.

“I have not committed any illegal actions,” he said. “I am not going to commit any now or about to. This is how my parents raised me."

'Our Way of Living'

As a human rights and anti-poverty activist, Mae Buenaventura joined the fight to secure the return of billions of dollars to the late Philippine dictator Ferdinand Marcos , his family and cronies hidden in Swiss accounts and other hard-to-trace places.

Many in his home country, Buenaventura said, “know that the rich have ways and means to accumulate wealth and also hide it in ways that ordinary people cannot get their hands on.”

The Marcos scandal also educated the world, encouraging greater efforts to uncover illicit money and punish people who hide it.

For the past 20 years, political leaders have vowed to "root out" tax havens. They have called shell companies and money laundering "threats to our security, our democracy, and our way of life." They have passed new laws and signed international agreements.

But the offshore system is nothing if not adaptable, and cross-border financial crime and tax evasion continue to thrive.

When an offshore provider or jurisdiction is exposed to a leak or comes under pressure from the authorities, others use their misfortune as a marketing opportunity, capturing customers who flee in search of safer havens.

An ICIJ analysis identified hundreds of offshore companies that ended their relationships with the Mossack Fonseca law firm following the publication of the Panama Papers investigation. Other vendors took over as offshore agents for the companies.

One such company was controlled by an offshore trust whose beneficiaries included the wife of Jacob Rees-Mogg, a member of the British Conservative Party and current leader of the House of Commons.

The Pandora Papers indicate that a holding company and trust for the benefit of his wife, Helena de Chair, held $3.5 million worth of "pictures and paintings."

Another company that moved away from Mossack Fonseca was a British Virgin Islands entity controlled by the widow and two sons of Indian underworld figure Iqbal Memon. Memon has been identified in news reports as a major drug dealer with ties to terrorists. His widow and children are accused of laundering drug money and have been wanted since 2019 by New Delhi authorities.

In the Philippines, money moving in the shadows remains a problem, despite the attention paid to Marcos' offshore loot. In recent years, the US has labeled the Philippines a "significant jurisdiction for money laundering."

Filipino political figures in the Pandora Papers include Juan Andrés Donato Bautista. He served from 2010 to 2015 as chairman of the Presidential Good Governance Commission, the panel set up to track the Marcos billions.

A month after being appointed to head the commission, Bautista created a shell company in the British Virgin Islands that had a bank account in Singapore, secret records show.

Bautista was later appointed to head the country's electoral agency, but was impeached by lawmakers in 2017 after his wife claimed he had amassed millions of dollars in undeclared domestic and foreign accounts.

In a phone call and emails to ICIJ, Bautista said he created his company BVI on the advice of bankers. The bank account was opened before he joined the government, he said, adding that he never received any large deposits and that he disclosed his interests to authorities. He denied any wrongdoing and said there are no formal charges against him.

Despite the failures of the Philippines and other nations to stem the flow of covert money, Buenaventura and other reform advocates say there is reason for hope.

Street protesters helped topple top leaders in Iceland and Pakistan after the Panama Papers. The Philippines has joined dozens of countries now requiring companies to disclose their true owners. Philippine authorities have recovered approximately $4 billion stolen by Marcos and his circle, using it to buy land for landless farmers and to compensate the families of people who were killed or "disappeared" by the Marcos regime.

Many obstacles remain. Big banks, law firms and other powerful groups often oppose tougher transparency rules and tougher enforcement of foreign abuses. And in the Philippines and many other countries, anti-corruption activists face legal threats, arrests and violence.

Last month, police fired water cannons at protesters marking the 49th anniversary of Marcos' declaration of martial law, drawing attention to similarities to the current government of President Rodrigo Duterte.

Buenaventura said she and other grassroots activists will continue to work to expose wealth that is "deeply hidden."

“Our motto is: The truth will come out.”

Contributors: Michael W. Hudson, Scilla Alecci, Will Fitzgibbon, Agustin Armendariz, Sydney P. Freedberg, Margot Gibbs, Malia Politzer, Delphine Reuter, Emilia Díaz-Struck, Gerard Ryle, Ben Hallman, Dean Starkman, Fergus Shiel, Serdar Vardar and Pelin Ünker (DW Turkey), Elyssa Christine Lopez and Karol Ilagan (Philippine Center for Investigative Journalism), Pavla Holcová (Investigace, Czech Republic), Hala Nassredine (Daraj, Lebanon), Allan de Abreu (Piauí Magazine, Brazil ), Leo Sisti and Paolo Biondani (L'Espresso, Italy), Simon Goodley (The Guardian, United Kingdom), Ritu Sarin (The Indian Express), Nassos Stylianou (BBC, United Kingdom), Francisco Rodríguez and Enrique Naveda (Plaza Pública , Guatemala), Debra Cenziper (Washington Post, USA), Jelena Cosic, Spencer Woodman, Brenda Medina, Maggie Michael, Richard HP Sia, Kathleen Cahill, Joe Hillhouse, Mia Zuckerkandel,Asraa Mustufa, Hamish Boland-Rudder, Miguel Fiandor Gutiérrez, Pierre Romera, Madeline O'Leary, Tom Stites, Kathryn Kranhold, Margot Williams, Antonio Cucho Gamboa, Soline Ledésert, Bruno Thomas, Anne L'Hôte, Madeline O'Leary, Maxime Vanza Lutaonda, Denise Hassanzade Ajiri, Jesús Escudero , Marcos García Rey, Mago Torres, Karrie Kehoe, Sean McGoey, Anisha Kohli, Fakhar Durrani, Carlos Monteiro, Douglas Dalby and Laura Bullard.

Correction: Alexander Abramov was named in a US Congressional report filed under the Countering America's Adversaries Through Sanctions Act of 2017. An earlier version of this story erroneously claimed that Abramov was sanctioned.

Tags: Money launderingInternational Consortium of Investigative Journalistsoffshore financeICIJBillionairesPandora Papers: Offshore BusinessPoliticianshidden richesOffshore secrecy