Germany wants to create a 'transparency register' after the Panama Papers leaks

Associated Press/Markus Schreiber

Germany's justice minister is proposing setting up a national "transparency register" that would list the real beneficiaries of letter-box companies — but only those set up in the country itself.

Heiko Maas' proposal Tuesday to expand national money-laundering legislation followed a massive leak of documents from a Panama-based law firm. German daily Sueddeutsche Zeitung reported Tuesday that 28 German banks used the company's services to set up or administer over 1,200 shell companies.

Maas conceded that German legislation could only apply to companies set up in Germany, which has pushed for tax havens to open up. He said: "Those who are pushing for this at the international level have to have corresponding national rules themselves."

Maas added: "I can imagine many countries considering this."

German Chancellor Angela Merkel and top economic officials also called for greater transparency in the wake of the publication of thousands of names of people who conducted offshore financial activity through a Panamanian law firm.

Merkel spoke after a previously-scheduled Tuesday meeting with the heads of the World Bank, the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development, the International Monetary Fund, the International Labor Organization and the World Trade Organization.

She said the new corruption allegations show "the theme of transparency is of the greatest importance."

OECD Secretary-General Angel Gurria said it was an "exceptional situation which we should profit from" by pressuring Panama to join international financial disclosure agreements.

World Bank President Jim Yong Kim called it "an opportunity to continue and aggressively move forward to find how these illicit financial flows are moving."

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