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Panama Papers: David Cameron admits profiting from fund

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British PM says he sold stake in his late father’s offshore investment fund four months before taking office in 2010.

Cameron has claimed to be leading efforts to clamp down on offshore havens, but the leak has led to criticism [Stefan Wermuth/Reuters]

Cameron has claimed to be leading efforts to clamp down on offshore havens, but the leak has led to criticism [Stefan Wermuth/Reuters]

by Al Jazeera

British Prime Minister David Cameron has admitted he benefited from the offshore investment fund set up by his late father.

After days of pressure following the publication of the Panama Papers leak, Cameron said on Thursday he owned a stake in the Blairmore trust, which he sold in 2010 four months before taking office.

“We owned 5,000 units in Blairmore Investment Trust, which we sold in January 2010. That was worth something like £30,000 ($42,000),” Cameron told Britain’s ITV television.

“I sold them all in 2010, because if I was going to become prime minister, I didn’t want anyone to say you have other agendas, vested interests,” the Conservative leader added.

“I paid income tax on the dividends. There was a profit on it but it was less than the capital gains tax allowance, so I didn’t pay capital gains tax.”

Refusing to comment

Cameron’s late father, Ian, was among the tens of thousands of people named in the leaked documents from law firm Mossack Fonseca.

The revelations showed how the world’s rich and powerful are able to stash their wealth and avoid taxes.

After having at first described it as a private matter, Cameron’s office said on Tuesday that he and his family did not benefit from any such funds at present.

Cameron also said he did not own any shares or have any offshore funds.

But his failure to say whether he or his family would benefit in the future only intensified media speculation the following days, with the story splashed across many newspaper front pages on Wednesday.

“There are no offshore funds or trusts which the prime minister, Mrs Cameron or their children will benefit from in future,” the spokesperson said on Wednesday.

Cameron has cast himself as a champion in the fight against tax evasion, particularly in British-linked territories such as the British Virgin Islands and Cayman Islands.

However, the opposition Labour Party has said the Panama Papers show the government has failed to tackle the issue.

Panama Papers

The International Consortium of Investigative Journalism, a non-profit group in the US, said the cache of 11.5 million records detailed the offshore holdings of a dozen current and former world leaders, as well as businessmen, criminals, celebrities and sports stars.

On Tuesday, Iceland’s Prime Minister Sigmundur Gunnlaugsson stepped down hours after thousands of protesters gathered outside parliament to demand his resignation following the Panama Papers investigation.

Elsewhere among sitting world leaders named in the leak are Argentine President Mauricio Macri and Ukraine’s President Petro Poroshenko.

The documents link at least 12 current and former heads of state and 143 other politicians to illicit financial transactions.

PM Cameron: Britain should join Syria air strikes

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Prime minister urges MPs to approve ISIL air raids, saying UK should not ‘sub-contract’ security to allies.

Cameron said the UK must expand anti-ISIL air strikes to Syria to deny the group a "safe haven" [Suzanne Plunkett/Reuters]

Cameron said the UK must expand anti-ISIL air strikes to Syria to deny the group a “safe haven” [Suzanne Plunkett/Reuters]

by Al Jazeera

Britain should join air strikes against the Islamic State of Iraq and the Levant (ISIL) in Syria, Prime Minister David Cameron has said.

Cameron attempted to persuade politicians to back action in parliament, arguing the Paris attacks have given new urgency to the fight against ISIL.

The Royal Air Force is part of a US-led coalition attacking fighters in Iraq, but not in Syria.

Cameron said Britain must join the coalition in Syria to deny ISIL a “safe haven” from which to plot mass-casualty attacks around the world.

“I believe that we should now take the decision to extend British air strikes against ISIL into Syria,” he said in a written statement to MPs. “It is wrong for the United Kingdom to sub-contract its security to other countries.”

On Monday in France, Cameron and French President Francois Hollande pledged to step up security measures after the attacks in Paris on November 13 that killed 130 people.

A parliamentary vote on the issue is expected next week.

Earlier this month, parliament’s Foreign Affairs Select Committee said British air strikes would be “incoherent” and ineffective without a plan to end Syria’s civil war.

Cameron replied on Thursday in the House of Commons saying air strikes were part of a “comprehensive overall strategy” to destroy ISIL and end the Syrian war.

Reporting outside parliament, Al Jazeera’s Charlie Angela said thousands of air strikes had been launched against ISIL in recent months and yet the group still remained a force in the region.

“There’s a big question whether Britain going in with air strikes would be all that effective,” she said. “This would be a good move diplomatically but it remains to be seen how effective militarily it would actually be.”

Modi UK visit sees business deals worth $14 billion

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modi-cameron

London: Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s visit here has seen $14 billion worth of business deals inked by enterprises of the sides, including a $4.4-billion investment by Britain’s OPG Power Ventures to add 4,200 MW capacity of new electricity generation in Tamil Nadu over the next few years.

Among the two-dozen pacts and investment commitments acknowledged by Prime Ministers Narendra Modi and David Cameron was one by Merlin Entertainment to open the famed Madame Tussauds wax museum in New Delhi by early-2017 and another by Vodafone to invest $1.4 billion to support the Government of India’s “Digital India” and “Make in India” initiatives.

This apart, the largest Solar power generator in Europe, Lightsource, said it was investing a little over $3 billion in India to design, install and manage around 3 GW of solar power infrastructure in India over the next five years in partnerships with Indian companies, led by Srei Infrastructure.

“Prime Ministers Cameron and Modi noted the deep and fruitful business relationship between the UK and India and welcomed the 9.2 billion pounds ($14 billion) of commercial deals between the UK and India announced during the visit,” said a joint statement issued by the two sides after the official talks.

Other major deals announced late on Thursday included:

– Standard Life, Bupa and Aviva to invest a combined total of $365 million in their Indian joint ventures

– Pact between Britain’s cloudBuy for facilitating $5,3 billion worth of transactions using an online marketplace

– British technology company Intelligent Energy’s $1.8 billion contract to provide clean energy for 27,400 telecoms towers of GTL

– Holland and Barrett International pact with Apollo to open 1,000 stores in India over the next five years

– Kloudpad Mobility Research’s investment in South India to make next generation smart watches, wearables and tablets

– TVS to open an advanced logistics facility at Barnsley, a town in South Yorkshire

– London Stock Exchange and Yes Bank pact for collaborations on bond and equity issuance, with focus on green infrastructure

– HDFC’s proposal for rupee-denominated bonds overseas up to $750 million under new Indian central bank guidelines

– Wipro’s commitment to increases its investment in Britain.

As per the joint statement, the two prime ministers also announced three UK-India city partnerships with Indore, Pune and Amaravati to support India’s ambitious urban development goals through technical assistance, expertise sharing and business engagement.

They also launched a new Thames-Ganga partnership for healthy river systems.

(Agencies)

David Cameron wins British election with slim majority

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PM Cameron says he will “go on working hard” after his Conservative party defies expectations and wins thin majority.

David Cameron

by Al Jazeera

British Prime Minister David Cameron’s Conservative party looks set to continue in power after it defied expectations and won the 323 seats needed to command a parliamentary majority.

The results confirmed a shock exit poll projection published by British broadcasters late on Thursday night that put the party way ahead of the opposition Labour Party with 316 seats. Updated projections put the Conservatives on 329, an absolute majority.

The poll also predicted Labour winning 239 seats, the Scottish National Party (SNP) winning 58 and the Liberal Democrats winning 10. Labour’s tally was further revised down to 233 as the vote counts came in.

The party’s leader, Ed Miliband, is expected to resign his position, sources within the party told Al Jazeera on condition of anonymity.

Nick Clegg, who was deputy prime minister under the outgoing coalition government, announced his resignation as leader of the Liberal Democrats after his party’s “catastrophic” defeat.

Clegg called the loss of more than 40 of the party’s seats “the most crushing blow to the Liberal Democrats” since it was founded.

Speaking after successfully defending his seat in Witney, Cameron said his Conservative party’s policies in the last government had been vindicated by the result.

“This has been a very strong night for the Conservative Party,” the prime minister said.

“Some people say there’s only one opinion poll that counts and that’s the one on election day, and I don’t think that’s ever been truer than tonight,” he added, referring to polls published before election day that had put his party neck and neck with Labour. A party needs 326 seats to achieve a majority in parliament, but this number is slightly lower in practice, as the Sinn Fein MPs in Northern Ireland do not take up their seats. Miliband, speaking after he retained his Doncaster North seat, said he was “disappointed” in the result. “It’s clearly been a very disappointing and difficult night for the Labour Party. We haven’t made the gains we wanted in England and Wales, and in Scotland we’ve seen a surge of nationalism,” he said, apologising to Labour members who had lost their seats to the SNP in Scotland. “I am deeply sorry for what has happened.”

Al Jazeera’s Laurence Lee, reporting from Westminster palace in London, said the scale at which the opinion polls had failed to predict the result had been unprecedented.

“What’s turning out to be the result of this is an extremely divided election, and a potentially very disunited kingdom,” he said.

In Scotland, the nationalist SNP has taken a near clean sweep of seats in the region, picking up 56 of 59 seats.

The gains came at the expense of the Labour and the Liberal Democrats, which were reduced to just one seat each in the region.

Labour lost 40 seats in Scotland and saw its regional head, Jim Murphy, and shadow Foreign Secretary Douglas Alexander lose their seats.

Danny Alexander, a Liberal Democrat minister under the last government, also lost in his own constituency.

The SNP went into the elections with just six seats from 2010.

The party’s leader, Nicola Sturgeon, who was not standing herself celebrated the result, after initially urging caution over the exit poll projection.

“Thanks so much to everyone who voted SNP today. Whatever the results, I’m very proud of our campaign,” she said in a post on Twitter.

 

A number of prominent MPs, including current ministers and senior leaders from across the political spectrum, have lost their seats.

The Liberal Democrats bore the brunt of the losses, their 59 seats reduced to about a dozen. The party’s former leader, Charles Kennedy, lost his seat to the SNP, and ministers Vince Cable and Simon Hughes also lost in their constituencies.

Former Liberal Democrat leader Menzies Campbell told Al Jazeera the party would have to “start from the bottom up”.

George Galloway, a former Labour MP and leader of the Respect party, lost to Labour’s Naz Shah in Bradford West, a seat he was widely expected to retain.

The Conservative Employment Minister Esther McVey lost her seat in Wirral West to Labour.

Labour’s shadow chancellor, Ed Balls, was also defeated by Conservative candidate Andrea Jenkyns.

In Wales, the nationalist Plaid Cymru held its three seats, and in England the right-wing UK Independence Party is expected to pick up only one seat, despite gaining around 12 percent of the votes cast. Party leader Nigel Farage failed in his attempt to take the Thanet South seat from the Conservatives.

The Green Party’s Caroline Lucas is expected to hold its only seat. 

 

Britain deploys more war planes to strike IS in Iraq

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Britain-IS-Iraq

London: Two more British Royal Air Force (RAF) war planes will join the military operation to tackle the Islamic State (IS) threat in Iraq, British Prime Minister David Cameron announced Friday.

The new deployment of two additional RAF Tornados came as Cameron visited RAF Akrotiri in Cyprus, where he also met British military personnel, Downing Street said in a statement.

“Royal Air Force Tornado GR4 aircraft have been in action over Iraq” as part of international operations against IS, also known as ISIL, the statement added.

On Thursday, the first two Tornados sent by Britain had conducted a precision bomb attack on an armed IS pick-up truck in Iraq, British Ministry of Defense (MoD) said.

The precision attack on the truck, conducted overnight with a Paveway IV guided bomb, was successful, according to the MoD.

On Wednesday, the first two Tornados on patrol over northwest Iraq were tasked to assist Kurdish ground forces.

The aircraft pinpointed the location from which IS militants were “directing heavy fire” on the Kurdish troops and conducted a precision strike with Paveway IV guided bombs.

Britain’s first bombing strikes on an IS heavy weapon position, conducted by RAF in Iraq on Tuesday, were also successful, according to the assessment announced by the MoD.

Last week, Britain’s House of Commons voted in favor of a government motion on air strikes in Iraq against IS after nearly seven hours of debate, which ended up with a vote of 524 to 43.

Despite an overwhelming parliamentary support for military action against IS militants, the motion ruled out deploying British troops in ground combat operations.

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