Cyprus Signs The European Convention on The Transfer of Proceedings in Criminal Matters

Jeremy Hetherigton-Gore, Tax-news.com, London

21 February 2000

Cyprus has signed the European Convention on the Transfer of Proceedings in Criminal Matters. The Convention allows signatory countries to request that criminal proceedings be initiated on its behalf in any other jurisdiction that has signed the Convention. A country receiving such a request can only refuse under specific circumstances where it believes that the charges it is being asked to press are of a political nature or it considers the charges to be motivated by racial, national or religious factors.

This development illustrates the extent to which Cyprus is necessarily choosing to burnish its European credentials rather than to buttress its standing as an Offshore Financial Centre. Cyprus probably couldn't have refused to sign the Convention (which is a Council of Europe initiative) during the EU accession process, but it is one more step away from the independence which a financial centre needs if it is to guarantee the privacy of its investors. Tax officials in high-tax countries equate privacy with criminality, no doubt, but investors can vote with their feet against such a simplistic proposition.

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