McClean raps rich states on offshore policy

Like the Bahamas, Barbados has taken to the United Nations General Assembly its case against some rich states which have attacked the island-nation’s offshore financial services sector.
Following Bahamas Prime Minister Perry Christie’s scathing attack on some unnamed “developed countries” Minister of Foerign Affairs Senator Maxine McClean, told the world body that it too was concerned about harmful efforts to weaken the sector.
“We believe that the sustainability of our development is being stymied by efforts to undermine this very important sector which continues to provide stable and substantial contribution to our GDP (gross domestic product),” she said yesterday evening.
McClean associated herself with the Bahamian leader’s comments before the same audience.
“We are a well regulated jurisdiction which has sought at all times to comply with international rules and best practice and it is our intention to operate within the established international norms which have guided this sector to date,” she said.
In his address, Christie warned the UN that should the powerful countries get away with their “ongoing economic aggression” against “small offshore financial services-based economies, especially those in the Caribbean region of which The Bahamas is part, the large and powerful countries could end up destroying the states with offshore financial services economies” and “destabilize the countries that depend upon them for their livelihood”. (TB)