The Council of the European Union has updated its blacklist of non-cooperative tax jurisdictions, retaining ten territories — including Panama, Russia, Vietnam, and the US Virgin Islands — that continue to fall short of international transparency and fairness standards, while noting Turkey's ongoing failure to establish automatic financial information exchange with one EU member state.
The Council of the European Union has published Council conclusions on the revised EU list of non-cooperative jurisdictions for tax purposes (C/2026/1465) in the Official Journal of the EU on 6 March 2026.
The revised list of non-cooperative tax jurisdictions identifies 10 territories that fail to meet international tax transparency and fairness standards.
Current blacklist
The list includes American Samoa, Anguilla, Guam, Palau, Panama, the Russian Federation, Turks and Caicos Islands, the US Virgin Islands, Vanuatu, and Vietnam. Each jurisdiction faces specific compliance issues ranging from a lack of automatic information exchange to harmful tax regimes and inadequate economic substance requirements.
Several territories, including Anguilla and Panama, have committed to addressing deficiencies by requesting Global Forum in-depth reviews before 24 July 2026 and 17 July 2026, respectively.
Vietnam pledged to resolve country-by-country reporting issues for reflection in the autumn 2027 peer review report.
Turkey remains under scrutiny
The Council expressed regret that Turkey has made no progress in establishing effective automatic exchange of financial information with one Member State. This remains a prerequisite for meeting criterion 1.1 of the EU list, an issue highlighted in Council conclusions since 22 February 2021.
Cooperative jurisdictions making progress
The Council welcomed jurisdictions taking active steps toward compliance. Jordan and Montenegro committed to achieving positive legal determinations on automatic exchange of information requirements for the 2026 Global Forum report. Brunei Darussalam received an extension until 30 June 2026 to finalise reforms of its harmful foreign-source income exemption regime, with retroactive effect from 1 January 2026.
The Council emphasised the importance of promoting tax good governance globally while fighting fraud, evasion, and avoidance both within the EU and internationally.
Earlier, the EU Economic and Financial Affairs Council revised its list of non-cooperative tax jurisdictions on 10 October 2025, adding the Turks and Caicos Islands and Vietnam and removing Fiji, Samoa, and Trinidad and Tobago.
