THE Swiss Parliament has approved a legislation granting 18 countries including Pakistan access to financial data starting from 2021. The new batch of countries for automatic exchange of financial information includes Albania, Azerbaijan, Brunei, Dominica, Ghana, Kazakhstan, Lebanon, Macau, Maldives, Nigeria, Niue, Oman, Pakistan, Peru, Samoa, Saint Martin, Trinidad and Tobago and Vanuatu.
Despite the fact that the implementation would start after over one year, it is a positive development which means Switzerland will provide details of bank accounts held by their citizens (or those with a fiscal residence in Switzerland). Meanwhile, in return, Switzerland will receive information on banking details of accounts held by Swiss citizens/residents in these partner countries. Though, according to the data released by Swiss National Bank, the money kept by Pakistani nationals and enterprises in Swiss banks is going down for the last three years but it does not include the money that the foreign clients of Swiss banks might have kept in the name of shell companies, which is one of the major concerns of countries like Pakistan. There have been claims that Pakistanis have stashed $200 billion in Swiss accounts, with increasing demand that steps should be taken to bring back the funds taken illegally out of the country. We hope that similar arrangements would be made with other countries, where Pakistanis have supposedly amassed their wealth, to discourage corruption and flight of money through illegal means.
