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Energy and natural resources specialist Juan Pablo Godoy will join Baker & McKenzie later this month to head the firm's tax practice in Colombia, after a spell as the legal chief of a pipeline consortium

2-4 years pqe Don't miss this opportunity to join a premier US/UK tax team. Broad role, open culture and an opportunity to stand out. (£US rates)

Malaysian prime minister Mahathir Mohamad has called for a new international tax on rich countries. This follows calls for a levy on capital repatriations from developing countries by Indian prime minister Atal Behari Vajpayee last month. At the Bo'ao Asian Forum in China this week, Mohamad suggested the UN could administer the tax, and use the revenue to fund development programmes in poor countries. Since part of the wealth of the rich countries comes from the exploitation of the resources of the poor, it is only fitting that they return some of it to the poor, he said.

US financial services companies are lobbying the US government for permanent tax breaks on profits earned abroad. Temporary provisions giving a tax deferral on foreign earned profits are due to expire this year. Estimates of the cost of the tax breaks to the government range from $800 million to $1.4 billion a year, with these figures expected to rise to as much as $10 billion a year by 2011.

The Swiss finance minister is considering a tax amnesty that would encourage private investors to reveal any undeclared assets in Swiss bank accounts. The Federal Council has opposed such an amnesty in the past, but the finance ministry now believes it could be worthwhile. Considerable sums are thought to lie hidden untaxed in Swiss accounts.

Ireland became the first member of the EU to be formally told to correct its budget on February 12 2001. At an ECOFIN meeting in Brussels, the EU recommended that Ireland take action to correct its budget, on the grounds that it goes against the Broad Economic Policy Guidelines agreed to by EU members, and threatens to increase inflation. The warning is a response to Irish Finance Minister Charlie McCreevy's 2001 budget that announced tax cuts and increased public spending.

You may not be familiar with the name SGI, but at some point you will probably have seen one of its products.

The Swedish Ministry of Finance has proposed that capital gains taxation on shares qualifying for the participation exemption be abolished. In general, the participation exemption will apply to shareholdings in Swedish or foreign companies, which are quoted on a stock exchange if the holding is at least 10% and the shares are held for a minimum period of 12 months.

Australia's federal government's innovation statement ? Backing Australia's Ability ? has been released to mixed reviews. The statement proposes changes that, on analysis of the detail, do not go as far as industry had hoped. The main changes are:

M&A activity in Japan continued at a healthy pace in 2000. Now, the government is planning to further facilitate the transaction process with favourable new tax developments. By Dean Yoost, Takuro Tagai and Al Zencak of PricewaterhouseCoopers in Tokyo