The Armenian MP on Panama Papers Scandal

• 04.19.2016, 17:58
•  Europe,  NKR

Member of the Armenian delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe Samvel Farmanyan disseminated on April 18 a written statement during the discussion on Panama papers held in the first day of the PACE spring session.

The matter is that the debate was opened on "The case of the 'Panama Papers' and the concern about fiscal, social justice and public trust in our democratic system". 

"While Panama papers have shocked the world community generating political crisis in many countries and resignations of high-rank officials follow each other, there is only one country in the Council of Europe area the population of which is not even allowed to get well-informed about this scandal yet to discuss it. It is Azerbaijan," the text disseminated by Farmanyan reads.

 According to Armenian MP, even members of Azerbaijani Parliament sitting at the Assembly can confirm it – there is nothing in these papers about Aliev family or "if there are some then it is the product of Armenian lobby! That is how the things, even not related to the Karabakh conflict, are read, perceived and interpreted by autocratic regime of Aliev."

Farmanyan then suggested that the date of revealing of Panama files by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists was one of the major reasons "pushing Aliyev to start a large-scale military aggression against the people of Nagorno-Karabakh Republic just a few days before the leak of papers simply to divert the attention of his own people from this breaking and explosive scandal."

In turn, Stefan Shennach, an MP from Austria responded that "We should use the Panama papers not to point the finger at individual presidents or families, but to talk about the principle of tax evasion in general and the harm it does to prosperity in all our societies".

To remind, Panama papers revealed hundreds of secret offshore companies with hided wealth, evaded taxes and committed fraud by world’s politicians and their relatives. The network of companies used by Azerbaijan’s ruling family and their associates were revealed in the Panama Papers as well.