French get list of tax suspects from Swiss: Report

GENEVA: France has received a list of 3,000 French taxpayers with bank accounts in Switzerland as part of a double taxation agreement signed between the two countries last week, according to a report in a French newspaper Sunday.

French Budget Minister Eric Woerth was quoted in the weekly Journal du Dimanche as saying the accounts contained some euro3 billion ($4.3 billion), "some of which is very likely linked to tax evasion."

Woerth called on the account holders to come forward and bring their tax affairs in order by the end of the year. He ruled out an amnesty for tax evaders. "That would be an indefensible injustice," he said according to the interview published on the paper's Web site.

Swiss officials could not immediately be reached for comment.

If confirmed, it would be the second time Switzerland has agreed to set aside its strict banking secrecy rules and hand over the names of foreigners suspected of tax evasion.

Earlier this month Switzerland agreed to give the United States the names of 4,450 American taxpayers suspected of setting up secret offshore accounts with the help of Swiss bank UBS AG. The deal was part of a settlement to end a long-running U.S. probe against UBS, which became the focus of Washington's efforts to crack down on tax evaders.

European countries, led by France and Germany, have demanded similar access to information about their citizens with Swiss bank accounts. A meeting of the 30-nation Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development in April agreed to impose economic sanctions against those countries that refuse to abide by the Paris-based watchdog group's guidelines for tax information exchange.

The Swiss government has since pledged to sign a dozen new or revised tax information exchange agreements, but maintains that the country's banking secrecy rules will remain.