At the meeting of economic and finance ministers (ECOFIN) on 23 January 2018 a decision was made to remove eight countries from the European Union (EU) blacklist of non-cooperative jurisdictions (tax havens). The countries removed from the list are Barbados, Grenada, Korea (Rep), Macao, Mongolia, Panama, Tunisia and the United Arab Emirates.

This move had been recommended by the experts in the EU’s Code of Conduct group. The reason given for removing these countries from the list was that they have made commitments at a high political level to deal with the concerns raised by the EU. The countries have been added to the grey list of jurisdictions that are monitored to ensure that they are carrying out their commitments. Countries on the grey list could be moved back to the blacklist if they are considered to have failed to keep to their commitments.

The blacklist was created in December 2017 following disclosures of aggressive tax planning in offshore schemes. The aim is to encourage jurisdictions throughout the world to adopt the EU’s standards of tax transparency. There are still nine jurisdictions on the blacklist, these being American Samoa, Bahrain, Guam, Marshall Islands, Namibia, Palau, Saint Lucia, Samoa and Trinidad and Tobago.