Paul Lewis
@PaulLewis
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Head of Investigations at the Guardian. Previously San Francisco Bureau Chief and Washington Correspondent.
London
Joined March 2009
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We've been leaked a trove of more than 124,000 confidential files from the tech giant Uber. If you have the app on your phone, you might want to discover the methods that enabled its global expansion....
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The offshore secrets of more than 35 current and former presidents revealed in a massive leak. This is one of the most exhausting, complex and potentially explosive investigations I've ever worked on.
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The plot thickens on the Michelle Mone story. Now it turns out she referred PPE Medpro to the Cabinet Office five days before the company had even been incorporated. Also, really important to flag that...
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Michelle Mone scandal spiralling tonight. MPs just voted to force the government to release docs relating to £200m contracts given to PPE Medpro. Four Tory ministers - Hancock, Gove, Agnew and Bethell - are now embroiled in controversy. And now this >
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We can reveal that the Tory peer Michelle Mone was secretly involved in the PPE company she personally referred to the government, leaked files suggest. So was her husband. Thanks to the brave sources who helped us crack this one – it only took us a year!
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Here is the definitive story of the Michelle Mone, Tory ministers and PPE Medpro scandal. Now also feels like the right moment to publicly thank the Guardian's sources. They know who they are. And none of this could have been told without them.
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This isn't a story any single government can censor. It is the largest journalistic collaboration in history. More than 600 journalists in over 100 countries. Here's everything you need to know about the Pandora papers.
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This marmalade dropper of a story is the culmination of two years of indefatigable reporting by
@david_conn
. Investigative journalism at its very best.
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We've had access to a massive leak from one of the world’s biggest private banks, Credit Suisse. It reveals the secret wealth of customers involved in torture, drug and human trafficking, money laundering, corruption and war crimes.
#SuisseSecrets
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Tory MP Daniel Kawczynski has been referred to the House of Commons standards watchdog. Follows Guardian investigation revealing WhatsApp messages in which he touted his “pro-Saudi” stance in parliament in a bid to get a second job.
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Credit Suisse asks investors to destroy documents relating to its richest clients’ yachts and private jets, in an attempt to stop information leaking about a unit of the bank that has made loans to oligarchs who were later sanctioned.
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NEW: King Charles is transferring more than £100m of his estate’s investments, including funds collected from dead people under the archaic system of bona vacantia, into ethical funds after an investigation by the Guardian.
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Data was leaked to the ICIJ, which shared access with the Guardian, BBC, Washington Post and others. Phenomenal teamwork that lasted – on and off – over 18 months.
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This is just the start of our Pandora coverage – watch this space for some major revelations likely to make interesting reading at Conservative party conference tomorrow...
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Today the Guardian is launching Cost of the crown, an investigation into royal wealth and financing. Here is why we think the UK monarch urgently requires this kind of scrutiny:
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We hear that people in Jordan are blocked from reading the
@ICIJ
's story about their King's secret property empire. They can read all about it here instead.
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...the credit for this story really goes to the late Jack Dromey MP, who sadly passed away last week. It was Jack who submitted a parliamentary question that elicited an answer from the government about the date of Mone's referral.
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Many Britons might assume that their government would routinely release such basic information as when a Tory peer referred a company. Not so. In our opaque system we all benefit from formal questions from parliamentarians like Jack, to put the government under proper scrutiny.
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FT reports how HSBC froze accounts linked to Michelle Mone and her husband Douglas Barrowman during corruption probe linked to PPE Medpro. Then discrepancies began to emerge between what Mone and Barrowman told the bank (see next tweet).
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The king argues his personal fortune is a "private" matter. With the help of 12 experts, our investigation team traced and valued assets worth an estimated £1.8bn. And we discovered quite how much of his "private" wealth derives from his public role.
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One place the Pandora papers could have immediate consequences: the Czech Republic, where the prime minister seeking re-election this week has some questions to answer.
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Buckingham Palace is refusing to explain why 11 pieces of jewellery that were official gifts (and have been worn by Camilla, the Queen and the Princess of Wales) are not being held in a trove of national heritage. They’re potentially worth £80m.
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Another is the UK, where the Crown Estate bought a £67m property from a company owned by the Aliyevs, rulers of a country riven by corruption
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Michelle Mone claims no association with PPE Medpro, which got lucrative "VIP" government contracts. Yet emailing two Cabinet ministers on their private emails in May 2020 she said: “We have managed to source PPE masks though [sic] my team in Hong Kong."
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Today’s Guardian is packed with revelations about Tory donors. On another other day, any of these stories would merit their own front-page. All of them are displayed beautifully across three double-page spreads. A good day to
#buyapaper
#Pandorapapers
Guardian front page, Tuesday 5 October 2021: Pandora Papers – Tories under pressure to return donations
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And Ukraine, where president Volodymyr Zelenskyy – who campaign to clear-up politics – will have to explain new revelations about his offshore assets
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It took two years and the threat of legal action for the Guardian to obtain documents revealing that Prince Andrew (and four other royals) concealed their shares in this shell company.
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Putin is not named in the Pandora papers. But people who have been very close to him are.
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Big scoop from
@harryfoxdavies
. Embarrassing, to say the least, for Boris Johnson. And a story that raises a slew of very difficult questions for his friend and Tory minister Zac Goldsmith.
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Hugely proud of the Guardian's contribution to this project. Too many people to mention, not least the subs, designers, lawyers, picture researchers, audio producers, videographers, data graphics illustrators and editors who are so essential for these projects.
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The Guardian has taken the decision to name three lawyers who issued incorrect statements on behalf of Michelle Mone. One, Jonathan Coad, has offered an “unqualified apology”. The other two have not.
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Buckingham Palace has for the first time publicly expressed support for research into the royal family’s extensive links to the slave trade. Statement was made after we told them we’d obtained a copy of the a crucial document (thread).
#CostoftheCrown
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But special thanks to an ace reporting team
@simon_goodley
,
@harryfoxdavies
,
@lukeharding1968
,
@JulietteGarside
,
@david_conn
,
@davidtpegg
,
@caelainnbarr
,
@rowenamason
,
@benbutlernews
,
@annefdavies
,
@PorcelinaD
,
@dominicru
,
@Andrew__Roth
,
@HelenaSmithGDN
,
@safimichael
and
@rstait
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Often overlooked: if
@lawrencefelic
,
@robevansgdn
and
@davidtpegg
hadn’t done the sterling reporting that exposed Owen Paterson’s lobbying back in 2019 (and prompted the standards commissioner to open the two year investigation) British politics would look rather different today.
If Boris Johnson had not allowed himself to be talked into trying to “save” Owen Paterson by Tory toffs from parliamentary discipline rightly coming his way, North Shropshire would be this morning a Tory seat with 23,000 majority + Paterson still MP. Talk about self-inflicted ..
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Thrilled to announce that the Guardian’s investigation team is expanding. We’re recruiting several new journalists, including a deputy investigations editor and a number of correspondents. Full details here, thread to follow.
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We only discovered that Mone had emailed Michael Gove on his private Gmail account, and Lord Agnew on a personal email connected to his private Norfolk estate, because the Cabinet Office failed to properly redact the domain names.
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Revealed: George Osborne’s secret dinner with co-founders of Google and Uber, who leapt at the chance to lobby the UK chancellor with “no hanger-on officials or staffers” around. It was one of six undeclared meetings Uber had with Tory cabinet ministers.
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Michelle Mone told HSBC that she and her husband “advised” ministers on procurement and complained that the freeze on their accounts was damaging PPE Medpro. (Remember: she told the public she had no involvement, connection or association with PPE Medpro.)
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Says a lot that in the UK we need investigative reporters to answers basic questions like: how much have individual working royals been paid? And how much work have they done, exactly?
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The High Court banned the media from a secret hearing where it was decided that Prince Philip’s will would be hidden from the public for 90 years. In the interests of open justice, the Guardian is challenging the decision to exclude the media.
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Today we’re unmasking ‘Team Jorge’, a hacking and disinformation unit who covertly meddle in elections. They told undercover reporters they’ve interfered in more than 30 presidential campaigns.🧵
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The source of the
#Uberfiles
has come forward to explain why he leaked 124,000 documents to the Guardian. He is Mark MacGann, formerly Uber's chief lobbyist in Europe, the Middle East and Africa. Here's his exclusive interview with us.
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So our head of state has a “privately-owned” £100m stamp collection that is comprised, in part, of official state gifts. Buckingham Palace is not even trying to explain how that might be justified.
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King Charles to receive a 45% pay rise from UK taxpayers. Treasury portrays it as a pay cut. Remarkable story.
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Another absolutely cracking scoop on Michelle Mone, this time courtesy of
@Direthoughts
and colleagues. This really takes the scandal beyond PPE Medpro.
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I don't think many Britons realise how generous David Cameron's deal with Buckingham Palace was. The Sovereign Grant was £31m in 2013. By 2022, it had expanded to £86.3m. Under the terms prescribed in law, the new king would be in line for more than £330.
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‘More than £700,000 was also transferred to the account of Mone’s eldest daughter Rebecca, as well as £3mn to another account Mone held with the private bank Coutts, the report states.’
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Every detail is a jaw-dropper. This is a huge story for Boris Johnson’s party, landing in the middle its conference. Investigative reporting at its finest from
@harryfoxdavies
.
#Pandorapapers
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The leak contains personal text messages between Emmanuel Macron and Uber execs, revealing how he secretly helped the Silicon Valley's lobbying operation in France.
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A thread on the Pandora papers and Rishi Sunak, who claims UK tax authorities "will look through those [documents] to see if there is anything we can learn.” Erm, how are they going to do that? HMRC doesn't have access to offshore files – that's the point!
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Uber paid academics six-figure sums for research to feed to the media
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Here is everything you need to know about the Suisse secrets project, why we decided to publish it – and why the press in Switzerland is discouraged from doing so because of the country's extreme banking secrecy laws.
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Marc Chagall and Salvador Dalí both gave Prince Philip artworks on official royal visits. Then they turned up in his personal collection. Brilliant piece by
@MaeveMCC
on the Windsors’ private art collection and where it all came from.
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NEW: King’s estate collecting assets of the dead is ‘bizarre feudal remnant’, says Andy Burnham. Greater Manchester mayor now calling on the government to initiate a public consultation over the archaic bona vacantia system.
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We can also reveal text messages from Uber’s former CEO, Travis Kalanick. Urging staff to stage a protest in Paris with Uber drivers – despite warnings they might be attacked – he wrote: “violence guarantees success”.
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Staggering story that deserves more eyeballs. Thurrock council borrowed £1.5bn – 10 times its annual spending on local services – to fund a string of questionable investments that went sour. Kudos to
@TBIJ
for years of relentless reporting on this.
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Scoop: HMRC is relocating to a Newcastle office owned by Tory donors via the British Virgin Islands tax haven. Jaw-dropping stuff from
@harryfoxdavies
and
@rowenamason
.
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Remarkable! The three main groups making up 60% of the European parliament are now calling for a review of whether Switzerland should be added to a money-laundering blacklist that includes Iran, Syria, North Korea, Myanmar, Panama and Yemen
#Suissesecrets
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The Conservative peer Michelle Mone is accused of racism by a man of Indian heritage who alleges she said he was “a waste of a man’s white skin” in a WhatsApp message. Big exclusive tonight from
@david_conn
.
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When Uber lobbyists wanted to pressure Boris Johnson when he was London mayor, they enlisted to powerful allies: prime minister David Cameron and chancellor George Osborne.
#Uberfiles
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The Pandora papers will shed light on the offshore financial affairs of major donors to Boris Johnson’s Conservative party. Starting with this incredible story…
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Michael Gove facing questions tonight over the Michelle Mone/PPE Medpro controversy. His explanation in an awkward interview with
@KayBurley
appear to be at odds with private emails released under the Freedom of Information Act.
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The leak points to widespread failures of due diligence by Credit Suisse that saw it open or maintain clients for a stunning array of high-risk clients. A human trafficker, corrupt businessmen, spies – an attorney who helped Ferdinand Marcos launder money.
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The Guardian is the only UK publication in a consortium of 48 media outlets given access to the data after it was leaked by a whistleblower to the German newspaper Süddeutsche Zeitung. The anonymous leaker criticised Switzerland's "immoral" banking secrecy laws.
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The Colston document is a symbolic piece of hard evidence. But the links between the royal family and slavery are far more extensive than one share transfer. They span centuries and several monarchs.
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A direct ancestor of King Charles bought at least 200 enslaved Africans, new documents shared with the Guardian reveal
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“Business isn’t easy. But it is rewarding.” Here is the backstory to how this incredible story unfolded.
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Michelle Mone’s denials vs what we know.
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The document shows a share transfer from the notorious slave trader Edward Colston (whose statue was toppled in Bristol) and William III. We are publishing it today as part of our investigation into royal wealth.
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It links the home of Prince William and Kate Middleton to the transatlantic trade in enslaved African people.
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The
#Uberfiles
reveal how Peter Mandelson and his business partner used their access to pro-Kremlin oligarchs to help the tech giant's secret lobbying campaign in Putin's Russia. Extraordinary reporting from
@harryfoxdavies
.
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Uber bosses also used a ‘kill switch’ during raids to stop police seeing data. The leak reveals it was deployed France, the Netherlands, Belgium, India, Hungary and Romania.
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'Diamonds, emeralds, rubies, amethysts, aquamarines and strings of pearls, all of which shine from parures of some of the finest necklaces, earrings, bracelets, brooches, watches and, of course, tiaras.'
Forensic audit of royal jewellery by
@davidtpegg
.
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We are publishing the document today as part of Cost of the Crown, our investigation into royal wealth and finance.
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Particular thanks due to
@b_obermayer
and
@f_obermaier
, the Süddeutsche Zeitung duo who have done more to expose offshore secrecy and financial crime than any other journalists in history. Bravo.
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The royals would like us to treat this income as "private", and entirely separate from the official Sovereign Grant of taxpayer money. Perhaps unsurprising, given the sums involved.
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The files also suggest ex-EU commissioner Neelie Kroes secretly helped Uber lobby the Dutch PM, during her supposed “cooling off” period after leaving the commission.
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We can tell the inside story of how two ex-White House aides, David Plouffe and Jim Messina, used their networks to secure meetings with officials around the world.
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To facilitate a global investigation, the Guardian shared the data with 180 journalists at more than 40 media organisations via the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ).
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You can read our banking correspondent
@kalyeena
's excellent analysis on what the revelations mean for the bank here.
#SuisseSecrets
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Michael Gove will be interviewed by
@BBCr4today
at 8.10am. Assume he will be asked why Michelle Mone emailed him and another Tory minister using their private emails on behalf of PPE Medpro, helping it secure contracts worth £20m via the VIP lane?
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Lest we forget, special shout out to
@ladywell23
and the other Guardian lawyers who do so much work behind-the-scenes to get difficult investigations across the line. Without them, none of this stuff gets published.
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Always inspiring to work in partnership with journalists across the world – in this case, including Le Monde and New York Times, as well as the brilliant Organized Crime and Corruption Reporting Project (OCCRP), which does so much to expose illicit financial crime.
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No indication yet the king’s estate will cease taking bona vacantia money - or change how it is spent. But this change in investment policy is a big deal, and comes in the wake of
@MaeveMCC
,
@robevansgdn
and
@Direthoughts
holding the royal estate to account.
NEW: King Charles is transferring more than £100m of his estate’s investments, including funds collected from dead people under the archaic system of bona vacantia, into ethical funds after an investigation by the Guardian.
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The king is profiting from the deaths of thousands of people in the northwest whose assets are secretly being used to upgrade a commercial property empire managed by his estate. Top reporting from
@MaeveMCC
,
@robevansgdn
@Direthoughts
.
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The very first line of Kathryn Stone’s report said it was “opened on her own initiative in October 2019 following media reports alleging that Rt Hon Owen Paterson MP had lobbied for two companies for which he was a paid consultant.”
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Our offshore investigations have focused on politicians for a reason. If they and their families benefit from this shadow economy, how can they be expected to reform it? That's why we reported last year on Sunak's wife's investments.
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The leak spans 2013 to 2017, and consists of emails, iMessages and WhatsApp exchanges between the Silicon Valley giant’s most senior executives, as well as memos, presentations, notebooks, briefing papers and invoices.
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Six months work went into this story, and we were fortunate to partner with the brilliant team at
@BBCPanorama
. Their film on Tory party donors will be broadcasting tonight.
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EU sanctions Russian oligarch’s sister after the Guardian and partners reveal her 27 secret bank accounts at Credit Suisse. Hat tip
@kalyeena
who stuck with this story despite the legal threats.
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Wow. Less than 24 hours after the Credit Suisse leak, the powerful centre-right block in the European Parliament raises the idea of adding Switzerland to an EU blacklist to prevent money laundering. That would put it in league with Iran and North Korea.
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And the Guardian's team talented team on this project – a collaboration between our business and investigations desks:
@davidtpegg
,
@kalyeena
,
@martinchulov
and
@lukeharding1968
.
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This was international collaboration coordinated by Forbidden Stories, whose mission is to pursue the work of assassinated, threatened or jailed reporters. Our inspiration: Gauri Lankesh, an Indian journalist killed after exposing disinformation.
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Investigation into Team Jorge already making waves in France. These people have been operating covertly all over the world so expect this will only be the start…
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Breaking > The Conservative party has received huge donations from a company that wants to build a “nationally significant" undersea power cable. Viktor Fedotov is the majority owner of that company. Here's what the Pandora papers say about his past.
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Delighted to announce that the incredibly talented and skilled
@manisha_bot
will be joining the Guardian's investigations team from the BBC. Few journalists in the UK have her OSINT capabilities, which will be a tremendous asset to our entire newsroom.
After 4 wonderful years at the BBC, today is my last day. I was the BBC’s first female OSINT expert, the only female conflict journalist with a weapons specialism, and still the only woman of colour in this role. (1/6)
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Back to Sunak, who said today the UK's record on offshore reform "is very strong". Really? London and the UK's crown dependencies and overseas territories are estimated to be responsible for a third of the global lost tax revenues that disappear offshore.
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Great news on the Guardian's US expansion, with the creation of a new investigations unit. Congrats to
@michaelwhudson
,
@skirchy
,
@oliverlaughland
and
@craftworksxyz
. And there's still two exciting vacancies to fill...
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