Julius Baer Bank approves website injunction
When supporting the closure of a whistleblower website, Bank Julius Baer was protecting the confidentiality and interests of its Cayman account holders’, the bank said. The whistleblower website published documents related to the accounts.
So that the documents that alleged tax evasion by some of the Swiss bank’s clients got removed, the bank procured an injunction forcing the closure of Wikileaks.org, however this website is still accessible through its international domains.
It should be noted that a US court action regarding closing down Wikileaks.org has attracted world’s attention to Cayman offshore banking activities, which was just weeks before US Government Accountability Office (GAO) investigators visit government officials and local firms which has been mentioned previously.
The bank claims that a former vice president of the bank’s Cayman operation Rudolf Elmer was the one to post the documents on the website. According to Charles Farrington, managing director of Julius Baer Trust in Cayman, in 2005 the bank became aware of the data that had been stolen from the bank around 2002. Farrington said that the bank informed its clients and kept them apprised of the efforts to recover the stolen data.
Eduardo Silva, chairman of the Cayman Islands Financial Services Association (CIFSA), said the following: “We are aware that the role of the Cayman Islands is sometimes misconstrued in circumstances where there is suspicion of abuse, but we are confident that our regulatory framework meets the highest international standards and that our reputation continues to improve in this regard as the information about our standards are communicated overseas”.