Whistleblowers lose appeal in tax case

LUXEMBOURG: One of two whistleblowers behind the so-called Luxleaks scandal that revealed tax breaks for multinational companies lost an appeal at Europe’s top rights court Tuesday against a conviction for sharing confidential documents.

The LuxLeaks scandal erupted in 2014 and sparked a major global push against generous deals handed to multinational companies, which grew even stronger with new revelations such as the Panama Papers and Paradise Papers leaks.

Raphael Halet, a former employee of auditing company PricewaterhouseCoopers (PwC), was fined 1000 euros in Luxembourg over his role in sharing internal tax documents with a journalist.

He failed with an appeal to the European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) yesterday.