デヴィ夫人、右翼とトラブル 街宣車に植木鉢投げる

デヴィ夫人、右翼とトラブル　街宣車に植木鉢投げる

2009年4月20日20時15分

　故スカルノ元インドネシア大統領夫人でタレントのデヴィ・スカルノさん（６９）の東京都渋谷区神山町の自宅前で１９日午前９時半ごろ、街宣車で乗り付けた右翼団体の男性とデヴィさんが口論となるなどの騒動があった。渋谷署は、街宣車の一部やデヴィさんのカメラが壊れたとして、双方から器物損壊の疑いで事情を聴いている。

　同署によると、右翼団体が北朝鮮のミサイル発射問題を巡るデヴィさんの発言に対して抗議活動をしたところ、デヴィさんは街宣車に向かって自宅２階から植木鉢を投げたという。その後、男性とデヴィさんが路上で口論になり、男性はデヴィさんのカメラを壊したとしている。

　デヴィさんは自身のブログで、５日の北朝鮮によるミサイル発射実験は「人工衛星だ」などと主張。１０日に北朝鮮を訪問すると記していた。

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Philippines to revise bank secrecy laws

By Roel Landingin in Manila

Published: April 20 2009 17:13 | Last updated: April 20 2009 17:13

The Philippines is preparing to revise its bank secrecy laws and strengthen the hand of anti-money laundering investigators following a brief appearance on the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development’s tax haven blacklist.

The OECD had put the Philippines and three other territories on a blacklist of countries considered “non-cooperative jurisdictions” after the Group of 20 summit in London earlier this month, but moved all four last week to a longer “grey list” of governments that have committed to comply with international tax rules.

Margarito Teves, finance secretary, said the Philippines aims to graduate to the “white list” of territories that have substantially implemented international tax standards.

“Because of a series of communications, the OECD felt they can bring us now to ‘category two’ but the objective is to go the first level,” he told the Financial Times.

The finance department wants stronger powers for anti-money laundering investigators, whose efforts to freeze or examine bank accounts are often blocked by judges who insist on giving account owners a chance to contest the authorities’ moves.

“On the bank secrecy law, one way of handling it is to completely repeal the law so that it will not serve as a hindrance” to investigators, said Mr Teves. He added that other safeguards will be put in place to protect depositors.

The Philippines has one of the world’s toughest bank secrecy laws, and the passage of an anti-money laundering law in 2003 barely lifted the legal shroud over financial transactions.

Lawmakers explicitly excluded tax evasion from a list of crimes that could trigger an anti-money laundering investigation. The country’s tax chief is only allowed access to bank information for estate tax assessments and to confirm claims of inability to pay tax.

The country lacks laws to explicitly allow sharing of tax information with other countries. The Philippines has over 30 tax treaties with other countries but these generally limit information sharing to cases of taxpayers also being pursued by Manila.

Taxpayer information is treated with such confidentiality that the Supreme Court has declared unlawful attempts by the country’s supreme audit institution to audit the Bureau of Internal Revenue’s tax assessments and collections.

Not even the finance secretary can examine tax returns without explicit authority from the president, said Mr Teves.

Mr Teves was aware that repealing the bank secrecy law may prove politically difficult. Lawmakers have hesitated to give banking regulators sufficient power to freeze or examine bank accounts because of fears the authority would be misused for partisan purposes, but Mr Teves expects the OECD’s moves against tax havens may help change lawmakers’ minds.

Though clearly disappointed with the OECD for initially including the Philippines in the blacklist, prominent Filipino lawmakers indicated that they were willing to support proposals to amend banking and tax laws to align them with international standards.

Prospero Nograles, the speaker of the House of Representatives, said last week that a measure to strengthen the anti-money laundering law will be among the bills that will be given priority in legislative debates and deliberations in the run up to the next general elections in May 2010.

”Congress will certainly look into our tax laws and try to conform to their (OECD) standards,” Nograles told journalists last week.