Shakira: Prosecutor seeks eight-year sentence for star over tax evasion

Spanish prosecutors are seeking eight years in prison and a €24m (£20m) fine for Shakira over alleged tax fraud.

The Colombian singer is accused of failing to pay €14.5m (£12m) in tax between 2012 and 2014.

Earlier this week Shakira refused an offer to settle and close the case. A trial date has not yet been set.

An statement from representatives of Shakira said she is “fully confident of her innocence” and sees the case as a “violation of her rights”.

The star was accused of tax evasion in 2018. Prosecutors said she was living in Spain between 2012 and 2014 while listing her official residence elsewhere.

People who spend more than six months in the country are considered residents for tax purposes. But Shakira says she did not mainly live in Spain at the time.

A document from prosecutors seen by Reuters claims Shakira bought a house in Barcelona in 2012, which became a family home for her and her then-partner, Barcelona footballer Gerard Piqué.

It asks for an eight-year prison sentence and a €23.8 (£20m) fine if the singer is found guilty.

The terms of the earlier settlement offer she rejected are not known. Shakira has said she repaid the money authorities said she owed, plus interest.

Officials demanded a tax bill from all her global income during the relevant period, not just that generated in Spain.

She declared Spain to be her place of residence for tax purposes in 2015.

In a separate case in 2019, her former husband Gerard Piqué was fined €2.1m (£1.8m) by the Spanish national court for evading tax between 2008 and 2010.

The couple announced in early June that they had split up.

Shakira, 45, and Piqué, 35, had been together for 11 years and have two sons, aged seven and nine.