Offshore sector defended at UK forum
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This is a digitised version of an article from The Cayman Compass's print archive. Occasionally, the digitisation process introduces transcription errors, or other problems.
See the article in its original context from May 2000.
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Bananas, debt forgiveness, crime and justice and economic assistance are among matters at the top of his agenda for the meeting. The Dominica leader has taken a strong position on the region's offshore financial services sector, and has vowed to defend the Caribbean's interests.
"Caribbean countries feel that there is undue pressure being placed on the young financial sectors in the CARICOM (Caribbean Community) area by the OECD (Organisation for Economic Development and Cooperation), to ensure that the sector is completely almost nullified and therefore prevent us from deriving the kind of revenue that we can, like the Cayman Islands and so on have done," he said.
Douglas admits that the offshore sector could be a "point of difference" in the discussions at the UK-Caribbean Forum, but said he was confident that there will be "friendly discussions" and Caribbean countries will be "firm in arguing their points".
"We have no interest in hurting the OECD because there is a relationship for cooperation. But at the same time it is not fair for countries which are facing 20-40 per cent unemployment to be hampered from finding ways and means of raising funds," he said.
Douglas said Dominica was prepared to address the problem of money laundering, and has asked the United States to provide training for personnel who are versed on white collar crimes and money laundering, so that it can take the necessary steps to prevent money laundering.
The Dominica government, he said, intended to build its offshore financial sector, and wanted to send a signal that it was ready for business as a premier offshore sector.
