28 March 2002
Revenue Minister Michael Cullen today welcomed the Cook Islands’ willingness to co-operate with the OECD in the
enforcement of tax laws.
The OECD announced yesterday that the Cook Islands had made a commitment to improve the transparency of its tax system
and to a full exchange of information on tax matters with OECD countries by the year 2005.
As a result, the Cook Islands would not be included in the OECD’s list of un-cooperative tax havens.
"This is good news given the close relationship between New Zealand and the Cook Islands," Dr Cullen said.
"It should remove some of the problems we have had in the past, such as the 'Winebox' episode, which demonstrated the
difficulty New Zealand authorities had in obtaining offshore tax data.
"New Zealand would welcome other Pacific tax havens following the Cooks’ example."
Ends