Financial Transparency Coalition

Since the beginning of the year, approximately 1500 people have declared their savings in foreign banks to the Dutch tax authorities. The Ministry of Finance says this is twice as many people as in the years 2006 to 2008.

WASHINGTON (Reuters) - Cash reporting requirements for U.S. banks may be expanded to non-bank residential mortgage lenders and originators, a federal agency that polices financial crimes said on Wednesday.

Chairman of the Organization for Economic Co-operation and Development’s Working Group on Bribery in International Business Transactions, Mark Pieth raised an appeal against a Swiss bank to release $6million in assets belonging to former DR Congo’s dictator, Mobutu Sese Sisoko, to DR Congo, but the court rather ruled the looted money to the late dictator’s family.

Finance Minister Pranab Mukherjee on Tuesday said that New Delhi has initiated a dialogue with Swiss authorities to obtain information on Indian black money stashed away in banks there — an issue that had raised much political heat during the elections with BJP leader L K Advani making it a major poll plank.