The Eurogroup may block an 8.5-billion-euro credit lifeline to Greece if the country does not grant immunity to privatisation agency officials from Spain, Italy and Slovakia, Spanish Economy Minister Luis de Guindos said on Friday.
In 2015, a Greek prosecutor charged three officials at the country’s privatisation agency over a sale and lease-back deal of 28 state-owned buildings.
“If there’s not a definitive solution for the situation of these three experts, the Eurogroup will block the payment,” de Guindos said in Luxemburg.
Greek corruption prosecutors raised charges against 6 members of the Greek Privatization Fund TAIPED for the sale of 28 public assets. Three of those members are Greeks, the other three from Italy, Spain and Slovakia appointed by the Eurogroup. The six have been investigated for the period 2013-2014.
The six are suspected of “the crime of infidelity” and the “non beneficial use” of 28 state properties.
The charges against the six members of TAIPED relate to the sale and leaseback of 28 state properties via the HRADF.
According to prosecutor, the Greek state suffered losses totaling €575,856,504.
The case referred to two auctions won by two private companies. The auctions was worth a total of €2611,310,000. The contracts were signed in May 2014 and the Greek state had to lease the properties back for twenty years in order to cover housing needs for public services. The leasing price for the Greek state was €25,589,800 for the first year alone. The Greek state had to pay lease also properties that remained empty or half-empty, with the loss being €6,661,678.
Prosecutors also pointed out that in some cases, the “fair value of property” was devalued, thus reducing the amount of money received by the state and that “the value of land was not considered as well as other factors of the real estate market.
After testifying to prosecutor the six were released. They denied the accusations, claiming that their role was merely advisory and not binding for the board of HRADF that had the final say.
One of the accused is the Spanish president of Property Agency of the Spanish Government, another is his Italian counterpart and the president of the Stock Exchange of Slovakia. All three participated in the Council of Experts that recommended the sale of public assets to the Board of HRADF.
The proparties concerned are: 5 buildings of the ministries of Culture, Interior, Justice, Health and Education, 13 tax office buildings and 5 buildings of the Greek Police.
In June 2016, the European Commission intervened asking that prosecutors dropped the charges.
PS Odd that de Guindos said this after the Eurogroup deal. He had at least one year to negotiate with Greece about it. Maybe a development judicial-wise is underway.
Spain is in a desperate state – banks closing down one after another – Italy’s banks look like they are all going to collapse – Slovakia is a basket case.
Desperation has made them deleterious.
No, it is not desperation. It is arrogance and full confidence that the Quisling government of the Greek colony will ridicule judicial law and the Constitution once again. And they will!
In reality Spain is doing us a huge favour and I only wish Spain could hold out on this refusal but they won’t. It is merely political theatre for the Spanish by another rotten & corrupt to the core Quisling government, folks!
It would be wonderful!!!! if someone finally said NO. They would be doing us (and much of EU) a huge favour by finally stopping this BS merry-go-round in its tracks. Lending Greece money so Greece can pay its current loan tranche? How stupid is that?! And what about next time…and the time after…and the time after that, while the “debt” gets bigger and bigger? And who benefits? NOT the EU countries, even though they were forced to underwrite this a few years back by the private banks via ECB.
The benefit is clear Tsigantes: the 4th Reich puts others to chip in (one way or another), and buys out Quisling governments and parliaments to run the place on their behalf. The money goes nowhere and does nothing (i.e. from the Troika’s right pocket to the left), while at the same time Greece becomes weaker and poorer. The 4th Reich buys all its assets for peanuts (airports, telecoms, harbours, etc.) and throws some bones to the others (e.g. trains to the Italians) to keep then quiet.
Nice, beautiful business I would say. A wolves pack assembled for looting and devouring.
And a set of stupefied people watching their lives and families being ruined and the Quislings having parties over their near-dead bodies.