WASHINGTON (AFP) - A US manager working for a Swiss bank Thursday admitted conspiring to help US clients dodge millions of dollars in taxes by hiding assets in Switzerland and Liechtenstein, officials said. Bradley Birkenfeld pleaded guilty to conspiring with co-defendant Mario Staggl to hide some 200 million dollars, liable to 7.2 million in US taxes, through an elaborate system of fraud, the Department of Justice said. Birkenfeld, an American citizen, who was reportedly a top executive at the Swiss bank UBS, pleaded guilty at a federal court in Fort Lauderdale, Florida.
Earlier this month, the Neue Zurcher Zeitung daily in Zurich said US authorities had urged Switzerland to help in the tax fraud inquiry involving Swiss banking giant UBS. “I believe this case will send a strong signal to anyone hiding money in offshore bank accounts to avoid paying the taxes they should,” said Internal Revenue Service (IRS) Commissioner Douglas Shulman. “The IRS will pursue people using offshore accounts in this manner as well as financial advisers and others who orchestrate these tax fraud schemes,” he added. More
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