[WATCH] Joseph Muscat sees no irony in Panama being blacklisted

Joseph Muscat says that he sees no irony in supporting a decision by the EU to include Panama in a tax haven blacklist when he had retained one of his ministers and his own chief of staff after they were found to have opened secret accounts in Panama

7 December 2017, 4:00pm
by Paul Cocks

1 min read

Panama has just been placed on an EU blacklist of tax havens

TWEET SHARE

Prime Minister Joseph Muscat on blacklisting of Panama

Prime Minister Joseph Muscat sees no irony in Malta supporting a European Union decision to include Panama in a blacklist of tax havens, when a serving minister and his own chief of staff had opened companies in the Central American state after the 2013 election.

Muscat, who was replying to questions put to him by MaltaToday, said that he had already said that Konrad Mizzi and Keith Schembri had done wrong.

“What they did was wrong and should never have happened, and I think I took all the steps I could and we even went to an election, where the public voted on the matter,” he said.

Muscat said that Malta continued to move forward after that.

“This decision [to support the EU blacklist] shows that our country continues to take decisions without letting itself be affected by anything or anyone,” he said.

Paul Cocks joined MaltaToday after having spent years working in newspapers with The Times...