After a week dominated by the terrible effects of Superstorm Sandy, the increasingly bitter struggle between Barack Obama and Mitt Romney and the continuing fallout from the Jimmy Savile scandal, it was easy to overlook a little story about an obscure Greek journalist called Kostas Vaxevanis.
In its way, though, the ordeal of Mr Vaxevanis, the editor of an Athens magazine, who narrowly escaped prison for publishing the names of suspected tax evaders, is the biggest story of all.
Its themes — the freedom of the Press, the corruption of the establishment, the arrogance of the elite and the terrifying storm engulfing the economies of Europe — go to the heart of a crisis that threatens to tear the Continent apart.
(...)
Until this week, few people outside Greece had ever heard of him. His magazine, Hot Doc, is hardly one of the Continent’s most prestigious publications.
Last weekend, however, he found himself catapulted into the headlines after publishing a leaked list of some 2,059 rich Greeks who have hidden more than €1 billion in secret Swiss bank accounts.
Given that one of Greece’s greatest problems over the last few years has been a corrosive culture of tax evasion — some estimates suggest that the Greek government loses a staggering €15 billion a year in unpaid taxes — it is not surprising that the list aroused an enormous storm. Full story...
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In its way, though, the ordeal of Mr Vaxevanis, the editor of an Athens magazine, who narrowly escaped prison for publishing the names of suspected tax evaders, is the biggest story of all.
Its themes — the freedom of the Press, the corruption of the establishment, the arrogance of the elite and the terrifying storm engulfing the economies of Europe — go to the heart of a crisis that threatens to tear the Continent apart.
(...)
Until this week, few people outside Greece had ever heard of him. His magazine, Hot Doc, is hardly one of the Continent’s most prestigious publications.
Last weekend, however, he found himself catapulted into the headlines after publishing a leaked list of some 2,059 rich Greeks who have hidden more than €1 billion in secret Swiss bank accounts.
Given that one of Greece’s greatest problems over the last few years has been a corrosive culture of tax evasion — some estimates suggest that the Greek government loses a staggering €15 billion a year in unpaid taxes — it is not surprising that the list aroused an enormous storm. Full story...
Related posts:
- The global war on free speech...
- Pussy Riot band members sent to remote prison camps...
- The terrifying rise of Greece's Nazi party...
- LIBOR scandal is the crime of the century, but where's the outrage?
- France's Francois Hollande: new boss same as the old boss...
- New Italian government does not include a single elected politician...
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