Shakira Says She Settled $15M Spanish Tax Case to ‘Protect’ Her Children, Not Because She Was Guilty

“Things are not solved by burning one public figure at the stake every year as if it were an Inquisition trial in order to recover lost prestige,” she wrote in a scathing public letter

More than a year after reaching a settlement with Spanish prosecutors over tax fraud allegations, Shakira is speaking out on her contentious legal battle.

The Colombian superstar avoided a possible prison sentence last year when she agreed to pay a $7.5 million fine in her tax fraud case. But in a new letter published in the Spanish newspaper El Mundo, Shakira, who has denied any wrongdoing, accused Spanish authorities of “burning [her] at the stake” in order to make their agency look better — and said she only agreed to settle for the sake of her two young sons, Milan, 11, and Sasha, 9.

“I want to leave my children the legacy of a woman who explained her reasons calmly and in her own time, when she considered it necessary, not when she was forced to,” Shakira wrote. “I need them to know that I made the decisions I made to protect them, to be by their side and to get on with my life. Not out of cowardice or guilt.”

The “Hips Don’t Lie” singer, 47, was accused of tax fraud in 2018, with authorities claiming that she lived in Spain between 2012 and 2014, and therefore owed nearly $16 million in unpaid income tax.