"The prime minister of Georgia heads a list of fresh names that emerged on Thursday as owners of secret offshore companies in the British Virgin Islands," the Guardian writes.
The latest cluster of names to emerge from the huge leak of BVI financial data include Bidzina Ivanishvili, the prime minister of the Caucasus nation since last year, and prominent figures in Pakistan, India, Thailand and Indonesia. They also include a Briton, Neil Gaitely, nominally a director of a company reported to be a front for the Iranian regime, the newspaper writes.
" Ivanishvili, a billionaire businessman, became prime minister of Georgia in 2012. Listed from 2006-9 as director of the BVI company, administered via an agent in Panama, incorporated in 2006 and still active. Spokesman says he has done everything according to law: "For the reporting period of 2011-12, Prime Minister Ivanishvili had no interest in the company … and therefore there was no obligation to report it in his [financial] declaration," the newspaper writes.
