Austria’s chancellor named as suspect in corruption probe

Austrian chancellor Sebastian Kurz has been named by prosecutors as a suspect in an investigation into corruption, in keeping with a replica of a warrant seen by the Monetary Instances after police raided ministries and political places of work throughout Vienna on Wednesday.

A warrant issued by the Central State Prosecutor for Financial Crime and Corruption (WKStA) cited Kurz as a suspect below suspicion of abetting bribery and perjury.

5 different senior officers near Kurz are additionally named within the warrant. Not one of the people named have been formally charged within the investigation.

The probe centres on whether or not pretend invoices have been generated on the finance ministry in an effort to direct €1.2m of presidency funding to pro-Kurz media retailers between 2016 and 2017, throughout Kurz’s tenure as Austrian international minister. On the time Kurz was positioning himself to take over the management of the mainstream conservative Austrian Folks’s get together.

Analysts mentioned the probe was more likely to deepen the issues going through the coalition authorities between the Folks’s get together and the Inexperienced get together.

In a press release on Wednesday night, Kurz mentioned: “Groundless accusations at the moment are being constructed in opposition to my group and me about occasions that partly date again 5 years.”

The allegations had been “systematically constructed” by prosecutors taking SMS messages and communications out of context, the chancellor mentioned.

Earlier investigations by the WKStA in opposition to get together colleagues had come to nothing, Kurz identified. “I’m satisfied that these accusations, too, will quickly grow to be false.”

The WKStA declined to remark.

The Folks’s get together mentioned the investigation was “politically motivated” and “staged for present”. Occasion deputy normal secretary and MP Gaby Schwarz mentioned: “[It is] all the time the identical objective and system: to massively injury the Folks’s get together and Sebastian Kurz.”

This week, senior Folks’s get together officers mentioned the WKStA was run by “leftist cells” who have been unabashedly pursuing a political agenda to compromise the chancellor.

Kurz promised this 12 months to reform Austria’s prosecutorial system and criticised the WKStA for its incompetence and poor report in successful instances in courtroom.

Police raids, ordered by the WKStA, befell on Wednesday on the federal chancellery, the headquarters of the Folks’s get together and on the finance ministry, two sources conversant in the WKStA investigation advised the FT.

The Folks’s get together and Greens have been in coalition because the starting of 2020.

“There has by no means been an investigation right into a chancellor like this in Austria’s postwar historical past,” mentioned Austrian political analyst Marcus How at VE Perception. “In fact, Kurz remains to be only a suspect and hasn’t been charged however the query will probably be whether or not, even with this as an open investigation, the Inexperienced get together will [want] to uphold the federal government.”

The chancellor’s earlier authorities, a coalition with the rightwing populist Freedom get together, collapsed in 2019 after a corruption scandal. Freedom get together chief, and vice-chancellor Heinz-Christian Strache was filmed on the island of Ibiza soliciting Russian assist for his get together in alternate for guarantees of presidency favours.

Kurz’s relationship with the Greens has already been below pressure.

A separate and ongoing investigation into Kurz, for allegedly perjuring himself in entrance of an official parliamentary investigation, has been a sticking level in coalition relations this 12 months.

The WKStA’s new investigation is much extra critical, nevertheless, analysts mentioned.

The allegations in its 104-page warrant appear “concrete”, in keeping with the distinguished Austrian political guide Thomas Hofer.

“Utilizing the ministry of finance and the communications division there to generate pretend invoices . . . that is completely loopy if it’s true. It’s actually taking the issues going through Kurz to a different degree,” Hofer mentioned.

“I believe that if there’s something on this — and we’re principally speaking about kickbacks right here — then it’s one thing I believe the Greens will hardly have the ability to swallow.”