(Read article about her escape by clicking HERE)
It should be reminded that Tsochatzopoulos is a founding member of the socialist PASOK party and served as defense minister under the Costas Simitis government between 1996-2001.
According to reports, she intends to reveal everything she knows in relation to the people involved in the major scandal which basically goes contrast to everything she has said so far (since she maintained that she did not know of her husband's shady dealings).
At the moment, the scandal is being appealed, with the former members of the Government Council on National Defense (KYSEA) at the time being summoned to testify in court. This means that former PM Costas Simitis, Evangelos Venizelos, Yannos Papantoniou, Vaso Papandreou and many, many others will be called to testify.
On February 15th, 2015, the remaining defendants that were on trial in the bribing case for the Russian TOR-M1 anti-missile systems were pronounced guilty by a Greek Felony Court. The five defendants (including former Cypriot Interior Minister Dinos Michailidis, his son Michalis Michailidis, former legal State adviser Anastasios Sofos, along with his wife Maria, and arms dealer Fouad al-Zayat) were found guilty on acts of corruption and money laundering.
As such, Dinos Michailidis received a sentence of 15 years for money laundering, Michalis Michailidis 15 years for money laundering, Anastasios Sofos was sentenced to life for passive bribery as well as 12 years for money laundering, Maria Sofos, on the other, was sentenced for 12 years for money laundering and Fouad al-Zayat was sentenced to life for active bribery as well as 17 years for money laundering. (Michaelides served as interior minister to two Cypriot governments. He was extradited to Greece in 2013 for the trial.)
According to the charge sheet, the actions of the defendants had facilitated payments by a Syrian-born businessman to Akis Tsochatzopoulos. The court papers said that the payments were apparently linked to a contract agreed by Tsochatzopoulos during his run in office to supply Greece with Russian made anti-aircraft missiles. All four had denied the charges and their lawyers said they would appeal.
It should also be reminded that Tsochatzopoulos was found guilty and jailed in 2013 for tax fraud and taking kickbacks for various arms deals, while his wife Vicky Stamati received a 12-year sentence. During the time of his trial details of lavish spending helped make the corruption case a symbol of the injustice felt by many Greeks who have over the past few years seen their pensions and wages cut on account of the economic crisis.
Swiss prosecutors are apparently going to receive testimonies from those already accused on kickbacks, including former defence minister Akis Tsochatzopoulos, his wife Vicky Stamatis and even his cousin Nikos Zigras.
Tsochatzopoulos is the key figure in this unprecedented scandal which has indeed shocked citizens all over Greece.
Yiannis Beltsios (63), an associate of Tsochatzopoulos, was also accused of handing over German bribes totalling more than 63,192,691 Euros and 2,960,225 Swiss francs to Tsochatzopoulos and to the former chairman of Hellenic Shipyards, Sotiris Emmanouil (61)
During the investigation, authorities also arrested Beltsios (63), on charges that range from felonies of active corruption to money laundering.
Generally unknown to the authorities was the fact that Beltsios' name surfaced in documents presented during the so-called "golden kickbacks" trial that was held against Tsochatzopoulos. Avatangelos, who was also accused of involvement in paying the bribes with Beltsios, was released on bail of 500,000 Euros.
German documents provided to Greek judicial authorities show the involvement of Emmanuel and Beltsios in the scandal. The former appears to have received the sum of 17 million, which was to be distributed in Greece as a "gift" to compensate for the decision to order the submarines from Germany. Also, the latter apparently acted as an intermediary between Tsochatzopoulos and the HDW/Ferrostaal consortium.
In a previous testimony to a Munich public prosecutor, Matados said that he paid about 1 million Euros to Beltsios.
"At MIE (a Greek agent of Ferrostaal), we were asked if we could pay something to Mr Beltsios, which we did. We paid Mr Beltsios about 1 million Euros around March 2000. I think that the amount paid in drachmas, I do not remember if it was by cheque or cash. I wasn't told why Mr Beltsios received this money. I believe it was for his excellent work."Although Matados subsequently denied some of the statements attributed to him, there are other stakeholders who have given similar testimony to the prosecutors in Munich.
Among them is a former senior Ferrostaal executive, Johann-Friedrich Haun, who claimed that Tsochatzopoulos advised them that "Beltsios was someone who knows a lot of people and who could be useful". According to him "the two of them, Tsochatzopoulos and Beltsios, know each other from PASOK and are very old friends."
In December 2011, a Munich court imposed a 140 million Euro fine on Ferrostaal, after two former managers, including Haun, were convicted of bribery. Haun was fined 36,000 Euros and required to pay an additional 30,000 Euros to charities. Both received suspended prison terms of two years.
It should be reminded that in February 2000, a German consortium, comprising Thyssen Nordseewerke, Howaldtswerke-Deutsche Werft (HDW) and Ferrostaal, signed a 1.14 billion Euro contract with the Greek government to build three Type 214 submarines at Hellenic Shipyards and a fourth submarine at HDW's shipyard in Kiel.
The consortium also incurred associated costs – known as offset obligations – to the tune of 1.53 billion Euros. Common but controversial, offsets are where a country demands certain economic benefits – like technological know how or the of local suppliers to build the equipment they are buying – when they spend large parts of their government budgets buying defence equipment from foreign suppliers.
Another contract, signed in May 2002 involved the modernisation of three Type 209 submarines at Hellenic Shipyards, with an option for a fourth submarine. The contract was worth approximately 469.4 million Euros. Offset obligations in relation to this contract amounted to 563 million Euros. As part of the deal, HDW and Ferrostaal agreed to buy a majority interest in Hellenic Shipyards, signing a contract for that on the same day as the submarine deal.
The bribes for the Russian defence systems are just the tip of the iceberg, and before Tsochatzopoulos was jailed many reports had revealed that there were just as many German bribes. (Aside from that, Tsochatzopoulos was also reported to have befriended many shady characters in Korydallos prison (or major mafia bosses).
The man who literally gave Tsochatzopoulos away is Nikos Zigras, or his first cousin. The latter implicated many suspects in the case including Michaelides, the general secretary of the Greek Defense Ministry during Tsochatzopoulos’s run as minister (1996-2001) Mr. Yiannis Smbokos, as well as Fouad Al Fayad, and Vlassis Kambouroglou (two businessmen that have already been identified as suspects in a prosecutors’ report that led to Tsochatzopoulos’s arrest).
Quite interestingly, Zigras had said that Michaelides had played a key role in transferring millions of euros in illegal payments which Tsochatzopoulos allegedly then secured for defense procurements. And we all saw what happened to the Cypriot Minister!
Zigras had also said that Smbokos pocketed incredible amounts of money from all these deals and apparently still owed money to Tsochatzopoulos.
In his testimony (which was given to prosecutors several years ago) Zigras had also revealed that former Cyprus minister Dinos Michaelides had been instrumental in transferring the money from the kickbacks by carrying the money in suitcases and not through a web of offshore firms as identified in the prosecutors’ report. What's more, Michaelides’s son Michalis had also apparently helped his father with some of the cash transfers!
The testimony from Zigras was so controversial several years ago that it also revealed how PASOK brought Russian-Pontians from Cyprus to vote in the 2000 elections and baptized them Greek (via nationalization). At the time reports that were following his testimony had said that after they brought them to Cyprus they paid them to vote for PASOK, and especially for Tsochatzopoulos, who was at the time running in the city of Thessaloniki. The same method was used with the Roma community as well.
Certainly, this comes as no surprise since it is common knowledge that the elections in the year 2000 were more or less "fixed" (or rigged). Some may recall that roughly 150,000 names suddenly appeared out of no where on the voting lists and allowed PASOK (and its leader Costas Simitis) to win with a slim 75,000 votes over Costas Karamanlis and the New Democracy party.
In fact, reports at the time had said that the number of residents in villages such as Evros and Thessaly and even citizens in the B' Section of Athens had increased five-fold!
The New Democracy party had a "lukewarm" reaction back then even though it had all the evidence against PASOK with illegal nationalizations from people all over the world (or from Pakistan, to Moldova). Till this day it is unknown why they did not react, but a televised report from a Thessaly reporter in 2011 said that the West had asked (and maybe even warned) ND to step back on this issue.
According to that report, countless chartered flights arrived and departed in Cyprus as well as in Bulgaria, during those elections, as did "suspicious" flights from "shady" airline companies that are commonly used by the CIA, a day before those elections and throughout all of Sunday until the polls closed.
Zigras told judicial authorities that Akis did everything in his power to get elected and in some cases he would spend more than two million euros to buy votes. In fact he was so determined to become an MP (so as to gain parliamentary immunity) that he would even buy season tickets for PAOK (northern Greek soccer team).
According to him, the ultimate beneficiaries of all this illegal money was Akis, and John Smbokos.
After this revelation, Zigras then admitted that he was the founder of Bluebell and Torcaso (off shore companies). If any of you have been following the case, then you would know that the second company received large sums of money from some of Akis' friends which he would in return invest in property all over Greece.
In this movement of money, Zigras had at the time also mentioned the name of Oratio Mela (HF apologizes for the phonetic spelling) which is specialized in opening offshore accounts. The latter, according to Zigras was also known for being crafty in the movement of money through these companies. It is at this point that Zigras described how the transfers were made between Torcaso, Bluebell and Morelia, which reports had said belonged to Oratio Mela, emphasizing the role of former Cyprus minister Dinos Michaelides.
Michaelides was the key figure in the case, or the man who arranged for all the deals to be made, the meetings and the decisions between Fouad Al Fayad, Kambouroglou and Akis Tsochatzopoulos. He is also the person who apparently carried the suitcases which were full of money, while he noted that Smpokos also transferred many sums in bags as well.
Zigras emphasized that he was not involved with the Nobilis off shore company -said to be the company which purchased the neoclassical building on Areopagite Street where Tsochatzopoulos and Stamatis lived-, because the Nobilis company was founded by Smbokos on behalf of Akis Tsohatzopoulos. Smpokos says, gave the shares to Tsohatzopoulos, who purchased this property through this transaction.
The purchase was a "virtual" reality underlined Zigras because not a penny was paid on the house itself but only on the taxes and its expenses.
Following the sale of the home, Zigras introduced Asterios Economidis of Arcon to Akis Tsohatzopoulos who is also in custody. Economides was responsible for refurbishing and remodeling the home and had become a good friend to Aki since then.
For the purchase of Komnas Trakas, where the offices of Akis Tsochatzopoulos were located prior to his jailing, Zigras said that Akis gave him the money to purchase the property, because he did not want to appear as the buyer. "Later on, when I realized the magnitude of the fraud that was involved, I transferred this property to him," he apparently told judicial authorities.
In his testimony several years ago Zigras also referred to an amount of some 2.9 million Swiss francs that was allegedly deposited by MIE in the accounts of Morelia and in Kiprou Mela (for the case of the submarines) and which were then transferred to Zigras' personal accounts in Greece or were given to him in cash.
"Everything is true," he told the judge, "I gave Mr Tsochatzopoulos the entire amount of 2,960,000 francs" and he continued on by saying that the money deposited in the accounts of Morelia, as well as all the cash that was given to him from 1999 up until 2005, all came from Dinos Michaelides.We saved the best for last, Zigras also implicated Tsochatzopoulos' present and former wife -Vicky Stamatis and Gudrun Montenchaouer, respectively- who he noted knew -very well- about everything that was going on.
According to him, Tsochatzopoulos never kept any secrets from his wives.
At the time he had also revealed that Akis' former wife Gudrun Molntenchaouer had consented to divorce him and was paid more than 500,000 euros to do so, while she received 3,000 euros per month.
He also implicated Margarita Terzi who reportedly owned a luxury apartment in Thessaloniki, which Akis Tsochatzopoulos purchased for his daughter. Zigras then told authorities that they should also investigate what price was paid for the flat and what Terzi's true relationship is to Tsohatzopoulos and Vicky Stamatis as well as how she suddenly became and adviser at the Greek Department of Defense.
It is going to be very interesting to hear what Stamatis knows, and if Zigras had actually hit the nail right on the nose with the testimony he gave several years ago which ultimately helped authorities put him in jail.
(References: HellasFrappe, ANA-MPA, ProtoThema, enikos, Newsbomb, Real News, To Vima)
To get a better understanding of this case we suggest that you also read:
How Paying Double For German Subs Helped To Sink Greece
http://hellasfrappe.blogspot.com/2012/03/how-paying-double-for-german-subs.html
EXPOSED - Classified Documents About Bribery From German Arms Manufacturers To Greek Politicians
http://hellasfrappe.blogspot.com/2012/07/exposed-classified-documents-about.html
An Introduction And Analysis Of The Siemens and Ferrostaal Scandals
http://hellasfrappe.blogspot.com/2012/06/introduction-and-analysis-of-siemens.html
More Arrested Over Bribery & Kickbacks Claims In Arms Deals
http://hellasfrappe.blogspot.com/2014/01/more-arrested-over-bribery-kickbacks.html
Russian Arms Exporter Denies Links to Greek Arms Bribe Scandal
http://hellasfrappe.blogspot.com/2014/01/russian-arms-exporter-denies-links-to.html
SPECIAL REPORT - Kantas EXPOSES Massive German-Greek Web of Corruption In Defence Contracts
http://hellasfrappe.blogspot.com/2013/12/special-report-kantas-exposes-massive.html
NEW SCANDAL - SYRIZA Targets Venizelos in Defence Systems Contract Fiasco
http://hellasfrappe.blogspot.com/2013/10/new-scandal-syriza-targets-venizelos-in.html
Venizelos, An Overflowing Bank Account and German Arms Bribery
http://hellasfrappe.blogspot.com/2012/03/venizelos-overflowing-bank-account-and.html
How Papakostaninou Gave 500mln to the A.Rossoni Group After The Debut Of The Memorandums
http://hellasfrappe.blogspot.com/2012/12/how-papakostaninou-gave-500mln-to.html
Forgiving Siemens And German Corruption in Greece
http://hellasfrappe.blogspot.com/2012/07/forgiving-siemens-and-german-corruption.html
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