Los ingleses nos ven como los piratas del mediterráneo

Y no les falta razón. Demoledor y acertado:

"The Sunday Times July 30, 2006

Investigation

Pirates of the Mediterranean
It’s a second home to millions of British people, but what are we buying into? For Spain has become a country full of corrupt politicians, prostitutes and gangsters — all fuelled by laundered money. By Stephen Burgen
Spain is different.” So said that famous Spanish tourist-authority slogan – and so it is, though not in the ways they want to crow about. The sun, sea and sangria destination that attracts 55m tourists a year has, over the past four or five years, acquired a dark underbelly, as the demand for a place in the sun has turned Spain into the money-laundering capital of Europe. Vast sums amassed through arms-smuggling, drugs and prostitution are being recycled into holiday homes for us British and other north Europeans.

Three headlines that have appeared during the past few months sum up what has been happening here since 2001, the year before the introduction of the euro: “Spain, Europe’s brothel”, proclaimed El Pais. “Spain, Europe’s second home”, said La Vanguardia. “Black money gathers strength in Spain”, ran a story, also in El Pais.

“People come to Spain to launder their money because there is an end market made up of people who want to take up residence here. Everyone depends on the end user, the Mr and Mrs Smith from Britain. That’s the way it works,” says Antonio Flores, a property lawyer in Marbella, a town which has become a paradigm of the corrupting power of the dirty money washing up on Spain’s Mediterranean shore.

Various events and forces – the collapse of the Soviet Union, the Balkan wars and the peculiar characteristics of the Spanish economy – have combined to bring organised crime, practically nonexistent here before the mid-1990s, to Spain. The other is the euro. Sometime before “E-day” on January 1, 2002, a lot of people woke up to the fact that the francs, deutschmarks and pesetas under the mattress were about to become worthless, so they looked around for ways of converting them into something more durable. What they found was property, and in Spain they found not only a booming property market but a culture where, thanks to a stamp duty of around 10%, almost every property transaction involves a degree of black money as both buyer and seller agree on a lower, fictitious official price, and settle the difference in cash.

All property transactions in Spain are overseen by a public notary, who takes care of conveyancing and pockets 2.5% of the purchase price. When it comes to completing the transaction, the notary will clear his throat and announce that he has to go to the lavatory, thus allowing the parties to complete whatever part of the deal is being done in cash without having to witness it himself. Everyone does it, rich and poor alike.

According to the Bank of Spain, in 2001, 100,000 Spanish properties changed hands for cash. In June, the Agencia Tributaria (Spain’s Inland Revenue) announced that it was trying to recover tax on €11 billion that changed hands during the first nine months of 2001, most of it spent on property, luxury cars and works of art. Critics of the tax department say that there was a Europe-wide agreement to turn a blind eye to money-laundering in 2001 so as to smooth the transition to the new money.

“There’s a big difference between the person who had some money stashed in a sock in francs or deutschmarks and needed to get rid of them before the euro, many of whom did so by buying property, and the huge sums we’re dealing with now that originate in drug-trafficking or the traffic of arms or human beings. These are people who are looking for legitimate ways to recycle their dirty money,” says Ines Barba, a criminal lawyer in Malaga. Leaving aside the fact that €11 billion would fill a pretty big sock, the point she is making is that the pre-euro spree opened people’s eyes to Spain’s potential as a place to launder money. “The suitcases of

Javier Gaspar, of the Guardia Civil police force and a specialist in organised crime, says: “Around 2000, these mafiosi from various countries, mainly in the East, set up operations centres in Murcia and Levante. They brought their bodyguards and conducted operations in their own countries from Spain. But now they have bases in Barcelona, Malaga, Valencia and Madrid. Their three main sources of income are arms, prostitution and drugs, and all of this produces money that has to be laundered.”

As we shall see, there are many factors that attract money-launderers to Spain, but the key element is construction, and to understand this, the sheer scale of building in Spain – and not just on the costa – has to be appreciated. In 2005, 800,000 new homes were built in Spain, more than in Britain, France and Germany put together. Another 860,000 are scheduled for 2006. One in every three new buildings in Europe is being built in Spain, to the point that there are now 23m homes for a population a of a little over 40m. Nearly 2m of these are officially empty, and far more are unoccupied for most of the year. Of the 800,000 built in 2005, only 350,000 were needed to cope with population growth and immigration. The rest, therefore, are second homes, concentrated on the Mediterranean coast. Altogether, 34% of Spain’s Mediterranean coast is already built up; the figure rises to above 50% in areas such as the Costa del Sol and Costa Blanca.

And it’s not just the coast. Up to 15 miles inland, in parts of Valencia and Andalusia, the countryside is disappearing. On the 25-mile stretch of road that runs inland from Marbella to Malaga, there are dozens of holiday developments. Marbella itself is a place apart, geographically in Spain but otherwise in a world of its own. It is not just some Skegness-in-the-sun like Torremolinos: it is more international than that, far more Dolce & Gabbana than fish and chips, a place for the pampered who can choose between any number of beauty and health clinics to prepare them for a browse around Prada or Cartier. Women with big hair and implants, 50-year-old men sporting 30-year-old abdominals – like an animated version of Hello!

This frenetic pace of development poses serious questions of sustainability, both because of Spain’s limited ability to generate electricity and its even more fragile water supplies. A huge new urban development of 13,500 flats near Toledo, south of Madrid, was given the green light despite the fact that there was insufficient water to maintain it. Water has since been diverted from hundreds of miles away.

The Toledo development, where permission had been granted by successive Partido Popular (the People’s party; conservative) and Socialist administrations, reflects official ambivalence towards the funding of property development.

All parties are implicated in, effectively, selling planning permissions. It is an open secret that this is a significant part of how political parties fund themselves, so nobody is in a position to throw stones. While it is impossible to say to what degree the government benefits directly from money-laundering (aside from the 16% Vat on all transactions), it is clear that if you took construction out of the Spanish economy, the country would be in a state of collapse.

Despite fears that Spain may be killing the golden goose if overdevelopment destroys its innate attractions, at present there is no sign of
a slowdown, and with demand high and supply sustained by dirty money, no power on earth seems capable of putting a brake on construction.

Close to 250,000 Britons are registered as permanent residents in Spain, with a further 133,000 Germans and about 300,000 other European nationals. These are figures for people who live here year-round, and don’t take into account those who spend a few weeks a year in their holiday villa or time-share. According to the Madrid Association of Construction Companies, 80,000 foreigners will buy homes in Spain this year, a

Mmartin, algunos no sabemos inglés. Podrías hacernos un resumen por lo menos.

Coño, es que ahora ando cansado, después de la traducción del anterior post. Mañana lo traduzco. No tiene desperdicio. Es una radiografía de la ejpaña mafiosa, metida en el lavado mediante lo inmobiliario. Mañana, prometido.

Por mí no hace falta que lo traduzcas, me vale con un resumen.
Gracias.

Resumen: aclara a los perplejos británicos por qué en Ejpaña nos salen los billetes de 500 por las orejas, pero casi nadie los ha visto. Es un sumario espectral de nuestra mierda patria.

"The Sunday Times 30 de julio de 2006

Investigación

Piratas del Mediterráneo.

Es un segundo hogar para millones de británicos, ¿pero dónde nos estamos metiendo? España se ha convertido en un país lleno de políticos corruptos, prostitutas y gangsters -todos propulsados por dinero blanqueado. Por Stephen Burgen

España es diferente. Así lo decía ese famoso eslógan de las autoridades turísticas españolas – y así es, aunque no en el sentido que ellos querían alardear. El destino de sol, mar y sangría que atrae a 55 millones de turistas al año ha adquirido, tras los últimos 4 o 5 años, un oscuro punto débil, a medida que la demanda por un lugar en el sol ha convertido España en la capital del blanqueo de dinero de Europa. Vastas sumas amasadas a través del tráfico de armas, drogas y prostitución están siendo recicladas en casas de vacaciones para nosotros los británicos y para otros noreuropeos.

Tres titulares que han aparecido durante los últimos meses resumen que lo que ha estado pasando aquí desde 2001, el año anterior a la introducción del euro: "España, el burdel de Europa", proclamaba El País. "España, segundo hogar de Europa decía La Vanguardia. "Dinero negro se hace fuerte en España", decía una historia, también en El Pais.

"La gente viene a España a lavar su dinero porque hay un un mercado hecho por gente que quiere tener su residencia aquí. Todo el mundo depende del usuario final, el Sr. y la Sra. Smith de Gran Bretaña. Así funciona", dice Antonio Flores, un abogado de la propiedad en Marbella, una ciudad que se ha convertido en el paradigma del corruptor poder del lavado de dinero sucio en la costa mediterránea española.

Varios eventos y fuerzas - el colapso de la Unión Soviética, la guerra de los Balcanes y las peculiares características de la economía española - se han combinado para traer a España al crímen organizado, practicamente inexistente aquí antes de la mitad de los 90. La otra es el euro. Algún tiempo antes del "Día E", el 1 de enero de 2002, un montón de gente se dio cuenta de que los francos, marcos y pesetas bajo el colchón iban a perder todo su valor, así que buscaron formas de convertirlas en algo más perdurable. Lo que encontraron fue la propiedad, y en España encontraron no solo un mercado de la propiedad en boom sino una cultura donde, gracias al 10% de impuestos, casi cualquier transacción de la propiedad implica un grado de dinero negro ya que comprador y vendedor acuerdan un más bajo, ficticio precio oficial, y establecen la diferencia en metálico.

Todas las transacciones de la propiedad en España se supervisan por un notario público, quien se encarga de la transacción y se embolsa un 2,5% del precio de compra. Cuando llega el momento de completarse la transacción, el notario toserá y anunciará que tiene que ir al baño, permitiendo así que las partes completen la parte del trato que se vaya a hacer en metálico sin testigos. Todo el mundo lo hace, ricos y pobres por igual.

De acuerdo con el Banco de España, en el 2001, 100000 propiedades españolas cambiaron de manos. En junio, la Agencia Tributaria anunció que estaba intentando recuperar impuestos por 11 billones de euros que cambiaron de manos durante los primeros nueve meses de 2001, la mayoría gastados en propiedades, coches de lujo y arte. Críticas del departamento de impuestos dicen que hubo un acuerdo paneuropeo para cerrar un ojo al lavado de dinero en el 2001, para suavizar la transición a la nueva moneda.

"Hay una gran diferencia entre la persona que tenía dinero guardado en un calcetín en francos o marcos y necesitaba librarse de ellos antes del euro, muchos de los cuales lo hicieron comprando propiedades, y las gigantescas sumas de dinero de las que estamos hablando que son originaria

Muchas gracias.
Verdaderamente descorazonador.
Seguramente en España está la lavadora, pero ¿con que dinero se carga?, ¿no será con el que aportan las mafias y “el Sr. y la Sra. Smith de Gran Bretaña”?. A las mafias no las controla nadie, pero ¿controla el Gobierno de su Majestad “al Sr. y la Sra. Smith”?.
Si mi razonamiento es correcto, entonces “el esté libre culpa tire la primera piedra”; en caso contrario pido perdón.
Un saludo.

No, más bien el pretexto es el sr y sra smith y el dinero negro y rojo viene del este.
buenas noches.
Mañana traduzco uno en el que nos ven como un cancer económico.
salu2.