Ten of the OECD’s list of 35 tax havens are UK overseas territories or dependencies of the British crown.
Britain’s crown dependencies consist of the Isle of Man, Jersey and Guernsey. All three are independently administered and do not form part of the UK. However, they are possessions of the British crown and not sovereign nations. They are treated as part of the UK for British nationality law, and the British government is responsible for their defense and international representation. The power to pass laws affecting the islands rests with their legislative assemblies.
Parliament in London retains the right to legislate for the islands against their will, though this power is rarely used. Many key officials are also appointed by the British government. As a result, the exact nature of the relationship between the crown dependencies and the UK is hard to pinpoint. However, the 1973 Kilbrandon report concluded that the UK government is ultimately responsible for the islands’ good governance. The UK’s Ministry of Justice now has responsibility for them.
The 14 British overseas territories are also under the sovereignty of the UK. The name came into being with the British Overseas Territories Act 2002, which granted UK citizenship to citizens of any of the territories, which include the British Virgin Islands, the Cayman Islands and Gibraltar. The head of state is Queen Elizabeth II, who generally appoints a governor as her representative on the advice of the British government.
The governor deals mostly with foreign affairs and economic issues. UK sovereignty was recently demonstrated in relation to another overseas territory, the Turks and Caicos Islands. The British government revealed plans to take control of the islands over suspicion of systematic corruption following publication of an interim report by a commission of inquiry. The Foreign Office said parts of the islands’ Constitution would need to be suspended. Again, the British government has the constitutional right to amend or suspend the laws that allow much of the offshore tax business. The question is whether it has the will to do so.
The Executive Yuan recently revised a page of its Web site on ethnic groups in Taiwan, replacing the term “Han” (漢族) with “the rest of the population.” The page, which was updated on March 24, describes the composition of Taiwan’s registered households as indigenous (2.5 percent), foreign origin (1.2 percent) and the rest of the population (96.2 percent). The change was picked up by a social media user and amplified by local media, sparking heated discussion over the weekend. The pan-blue and pro-China camp called it a politically motivated desinicization attempt to obscure the Han Chinese ethnicity of most Taiwanese.
On Wednesday last week, the Rossiyskaya Gazeta published an article by Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) asserting the People’s Republic of China’s (PRC) territorial claim over Taiwan effective 1945, predicated upon instruments such as the 1943 Cairo Declaration and the 1945 Potsdam Proclamation. The article further contended that this de jure and de facto status was subsequently reaffirmed by UN General Assembly Resolution 2758 of 1971. The Ministry of Foreign Affairs promptly issued a statement categorically repudiating these assertions. In addition to the reasons put forward by the ministry, I believe that China’s assertions are open to questions in international
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