Infamous sex offender Jeffrey Epstein had complained that using Cyprus to avoid tax is both “silly” and “dangerous” in an email, according to the latest batch of the Epstein Files, a dossier of emails and other communications conducted by him, released by the United States’ department of justice.

He was responding to an email sent to him by German entrepreneur Nicole Junkermann, of which former Israeli prime minister Ehud Barak was also a recipient, regarding the planned location for a European subsidiary of Israeli technology company Reporty Homeland Security, which has since changed its name to Carbyne Ltd.

The emails had been sent in July 2017, with Junkermann making reference to a man by the name of “Amir” who was “considering” setting up the company’s European subsidiary on the island.

She wrote that Cyprus “is raising eyebrows” and that as such, she “would propose Luxembourg” as an alternative.

Epstein agreed, replying that “the Israeli trick of using Cyprus to avoid taxes is silly, antiquated, and dangerous”.

Later, Barak also agreed, saying he had “ordered” Amir to “stop all steps” related to Cyprus and “be ready to change for a real European jurisdiction”.

In a separate email chain, on February 1, 2019 with American writer Michael Wolff, Epstein made reference to deals made involving former Bank of Cyprus chairman Josef Ackermann and US President Donald Trump.

“That Russian oligarch who spent that money on that property and never moved into it and ultimately tore it down, he’s also a large shareholder in a bank called the Bank of Cyprus, which has been implicated in Russian money laundering,” Epstein wrote.

He added that Ackermann, the chairman of the Bank of Cyprus at the time, “is the former CEO of Deutsche Bank, to which Donald Trump owed all that money at the time he conveniently got this very large influx of cash from a Russian guy”.

In this exchange, Epstein may have been referring to Russian Israeli billionaire Viktor Vekselberg, who reportedly offered financial gifts to Trump during his first term in office and discussed relations between the US and Russia with Trump’s lawyer Michael Cohen, who reportedly also received financial gifts from Vekselberg.

Cohen has since spent time in prison after pleading guilty to five counts of tax evasion, one count of making false statements to a financial institution, one count of wilfully causing an unlawful corporate contribution, one count of making an excessive campaign contribution, and one count of making false statements to a congressional committee.