BERLIN – German Finance Minister Christian Lindner could face a corruption investigation over allegations of a conflict of interest.
Berlin’s attorney general’s office is considering whether to lift Lindner’s parliamentary immunity and open an investigation into his ties to BBBank. Last year, Lindner gave a speech at a bank function after receiving a loan from the lender.
A spokeswoman for the attorney general’s office confirmed media reports on the issue and told POLITICO that the sequence of events “is typical in such cases” and that the office “will not make statements regarding the existence of preliminary suspicions.”
According to the spokesperson, based on the result of the ongoing preliminary investigation, informing the President of the Bundestag would be sufficient to initiate a full investigation.
Spiegel The magazine first reported about Lindner’s involvement with BBBank in October 2022.
According to the report, Lindner bought a property in Berlin for €1.65 million in January 2021 and took a loan of €2.35 million to cover the purchase and renovation costs. In June 2022, shortly before taking out another €450,000 loan, Lindner made a three-minute video to celebrate the 100th anniversary of BBBank.
According to the transcript of the video obtained by Politico, Lindner began his speech with the words: “I love BBBank from bottom to top.”
in spite of some German media reports Information available on the Bundestag suggests that the minister had “apparently concealed” that he had taken out a loan with the institution, that Lindner had worked with the bank before becoming minister and was paid for his appearances. Is. Website,
Lindner’s attorney in October denied the allegation of mixing his client’s private and official interests, saying that “there is no personal, material-related or even temporal connection between the official requested solicitation and the private real-estate financing”. There was no connection.”
On Sunday evening, the lawyer once again rejected the allegations, claiming that financing for the real estate had been secured long before Lindner became a minister.
Lindner himself tweeted report good In the FAZ newspaper, in which the statements of his lawyer were printed.
A finance ministry spokeswoman said Monday that the ministry was not aware of a preliminary investigation by the attorney general’s office, declining to comment on the prosecutor’s actions.
The bank’s request for a video was dealt with at the ministry’s management level, the spokesman said, adding that Lindner voluntarily submitted to the ministry’s compliance measures relating to private financial transactions when taking office.