The European Union (EU) tax blacklist published on June 17 has come under fierce attack in some jurisdictions and has stirred a panoply of different responses. While The Bahamas is demanding that it be removed from the list, Bermuda has already been removed; Spain may be pushing to have Gibraltar included on the list, and Guernsey is “astonished” to have been included in the first place.

And yesterday, Antigua and Barbuda – The Bahamas’ fellow member state in the Caribbean Community (CARICOM) – blasted back at what Antigua Prime Minister Gaston Browne termed the “unjust” inclusion of his country on the list, and accused the EU Commission and Commissioner Pierre Moscovici of having done “considerable harm” to Antigua and Barbuda and many other countries named on the list “in flagrant disregard of known facts about the jurisdictions”.

In fact, Browne demanded an apology from the EU for the damage it has done to Antigua and Barbuda and called for it to publicly rescind the flawed and injurious list.

Browne’s comments were contained in a strongly worded letter to Mikael Barford, ambassador of the European Union for Barbados and the Eastern Caribbean.

On June 17 the EU Commission released its “Action Plan for Fair and Efficient Corporate Taxation in the EU”, which included five key areas for action: relaunching the common consolidated corporate tax base; ensuring fair taxation where profits are generated; creating a better business environment; increasing transparency and improving EU coordination.

Part of the plan was a list of third country non-cooperative tax jurisdictions, or what is effectively another blacklist. The Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD) has expressed concern over the publication of the list, particularly given that some of the countries on the list have been declared either compliant or largely compliant – as is The Bahamas – with the standards of the OECD’s Global Forum on Transparency and Exchange of Information for Tax Purposes.

Minister of Financial Services Hope Strachan confirmed that The Bahamas has already initiated discussions with both the OECD and the EU about being removed from the list.

“The area comprising what is considered third country, non-cooperative tax jurisdictions from which the EU blacklist arises... is based on the independent national lists of EU member states,” Strachan explained.

“The European commissioner for economic and financial affairs, taxation and customs, Pierre Moscovici, stated that the publishing of the list of ‘non-cooperative jurisdictions’ was a decisive step in pushing the territories to adopt international standards.”

What is clear is the somewhat arbitrary nature of the list in question, and Strachan told Guardian Business that it was unclear how the method used to include The Bahamas on the list was in line with international standards, given the fact that The Bahamas is a cooperative jurisdiction which is “largely compliant” with Global Forum standards, and that the EU Commission has incorporated the Global Forum’s terms of reference into its principles of good governance in tax matters.

“It would appear that the EU has its own standard that differs for each of its member states, that they would then be able to include countries on their lists to be compiled as an EU list without applying the same standard across the board in line with the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development’s Global Forum standard, which is recognized as the largest tax body in the world with 127 member countries,” Strachan said.

The OECD’s Center for Tax Policy and Administration (CTPA) and the Global Forum issued a statement confirming that “…the only agreeable assessment of countries as regards their cooperation is made by the Global Forum and a number of countries identified in the EU exercise are either fully or largely compliant and have committed to AEOI (automatic exchange of information), sometimes even as early adopters.”

One such “early adopter” is Bermuda, which has been removed from the list by Poland. Poland, one of 11 EU countries that the European Commission (EC) used as its criterion to put Bermuda on the blacklist, signed a tax information exchange agreement (TIEA) with Bermuda which came into effect in March this year.

Italy was one of the 11 countries that named Bermuda in its EC submissions. However, Italy signed a tax information treaty with the island in 2013, and announced earlier this year that it had taken Bermuda off its national blacklist.

Strachan noted that the European Commission’s Platform for Tax Good Governance – which assists the commission in developing initiatives to promote good governance in tax matters in third countries – consists of business and tax professionals, and civil society organizations seeking to coordinate an effective EU approach against tax evasion and avoidance. These members are the tax authorities of all member states and 15 organizations representing business, civil society and tax practitioners.

“It is hard to accept that such a body of tax authorities and professionals agreed on the process used to determine the listing of countries considered non-cooperative issued by the EU,” the minister said.

She reiterated that The Bahamas has demonstrated its overall dedication to ending cross-border tax evasion by its implementation of the U.S. Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act (FATCA) and by pledging to facilitate the automatic exchange of information under the OECD’s Common Reporting Standard (CRS), beginning in 2018.

“The list published by the EU should be retracted immediately, as it is unfounded, procedurally unfair and insults the progress made by the OECD on international tax initiatives of which many of the countries listed are a part,” Strachan told Guardian Business.

“The Bahamas has already begun communications with the OECD and the EU and will continue to press this issue as we join with other nations in the Caribbean to resolve this matter.”

Meanwhile, as The Bahamas is seeking to get off the list, it is understood that Spain will call on the European Commission to include Gibraltar on the EU blacklist of tax havens published last week. Spain’s Treasury Minister Cristobal Montoro said Spain has “more than sufficient reason” to view Gibraltar as a tax haven.

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