After a high profile protest at the recent Glastonbury festival and constant criticism over their financial affairs, U2 guitarist The Edge has launched an impassioned defence of the band’s tax situation via a letter sent to the Baltimore Sun.
Responding to a correspondence sent to the paper on July 7th which questioned Maryland Senator Benjamin Cardin’s support of the anti-poverty One campaign, which is being led by Bono, The Edge wrote:
“It contains so many inaccuracies that it is pointless to correct them all. But the most serious inaccuracy is the totally false and possibly libelous accusation that U2 and Bono have, by moving a part of their business activities to Holland, been involved in tax evasion.”
“For the record, U2 and the individual band members have a totally clean record with every jurisdiction to which they are required to pay tax and have never been and will never be involved in tax evasion.”
“Contrary to what Mr. Moroney writes Ireland is, thankfully, not bankrupt. Had he bothered to contact the Irish Ministry of Finance, as did Spin magazine journalist Steve Kandrell for his March 25th 2009 feature on U2, he would have discovered that they have no problem with U2 basing some of their business activities in Holland.”
The protests during U2’s headline appearance at Glastonbury last month caused some minor disturbances between those protestors and police, but largely passed off without incident.