Latin American presidents grilled by Pandora Papers

The first revelations of the so-called “Pandora Papers” include three active Latin American presidents and 11 former heads of state.

Chile’s Sebastián Piñera, Ecuador’s Guillermo Lasso, and Dominican Republic’s Luis Abinader were among the leaders mentioned in one of the biggest leaks of financial documents ever published, coordinated by the International Consortium of Investigative Journalists (ICIJ) — also behind the reporting of the Panama Papers and Paradise Papers leaks.

As has been readily pointed out — particularly by those implicated — being named in the Pandora Papers does not necessarily imply that a crime has been committed. Offshore financial data leaks such as these often expose complex international networks used to hide information from the public or reduce the amount of taxes that a company or individual is legally required to pay, but in many countries, it is not illegal to own offshore companies in tax havens.

As the amount of information included in the Pandora Papers is so vast, journalists around the world are tasked with trawling through swathes of raw data leaked from banks and law firms, making sense of the findings, cross-checking them with other sources, adding context, and presenting them to the public.

In Colombia, the leaks included former Presidents César Gaviria and Andrés Pastrana, indicating that the latter used a shell company...