The Vaxevanis trial: no lawyers, no witnesses? Apparently no problem.

Posted by @IrateGreek

As we posted earlier today, the re-trial of Kostas Vaxevanis for publishing, back in October 2012, a list of 2000+ names of Greek bank account holders in Switzerland, known as the Lagarde list, was due to take place this morning in the Athens courthouse. It took the court a full hour and a half, from 9:00 until 10:30am, and three private conversations in recess, to determine that, in the absence of two of three defense lawyers and of three of four defense witnesses, the trial should be postponed.

The Lagarde list and the trial of Kostas Vaxevanis

By @Polyfimos, translated by @Pexlibanis and @anarresti

On  6 June 2013, former Greek economy czar George Papaconstantinou watched the plenary assembly of the Greek Parliament, which had already  impeached him for doctoring a document and engaging in misconduct, vote to expand charges against him to criminal breach of faith in the scandal of the altered list of 2062 Greek bank account holders in Switzerland, known as  the Lagarde list.

Four  days later, Kostas Vaxevanis, the journalist who was arrested and tried because he first published the names on the list on 27 October 2012, is, for the second time, sitting in the defendant's chair for the same court case, after the prosecution demanded a re-trial, because the court "did not give proper weight to the evidence material and considered it very poorly."

This comes after his first trial on 1 November 2012, which, as pointed out by Kostas Vaxevanis  in an open letter to European Commission President Jose Manuel  Barroso, was conducted ​​with such haste that "the original case file did not include a single element of evidence, not even the incriminating issue of the magazine. The charges were so hastily put together that they even forgot to put the official stamp of the prosecutor on the file."

"Sue Venizelos now!" by Kostas Vaxevanis

By Kostas Vaxevanis

Re-posted and translated from Pandora's Box by @IrateGreek

Is there a prosecutor to do the obvious? Yes, I know, this sentence has been written and said thousands of times before, but I don't know what else I can write anymore. The Parliamentary Committee investigating the issue of the Lagarde list [1] has now officially received from the French authorities documents describing how the list arrived in Greece. This fully confirms HotDoc's findings: we wrote that the list arrived through official channels from France, together with official handover and delivery notes, in order for it to be used by the tax department. Everything we uncovered as journalists with information provided the French Ministry of Foreign Affairs and the Greek Embassy in Paris has now been forwarded, officially, to Parliament.

Freedom of the press in Greece: an interview with Leon Willems

The following post is a transcript of this interview with Leon Willems, the director of Free Press Unlimited. It was translated by @iptamenos33. 


- Mister Willems, good morning!
- Good morning?
- In which European holiday-countries are journalists facing difficulties?
- Ah, well, it's very interesting to see that in a couple of Southern European countries, things are getting worse constantly, for instance in Greece.

#rbnews international weekly bulletin 30 March - 05 April 2013

The text companion to this week's #rbnews international show is now online. You can read it after the jump.

#rbnews international weekly bulletin 19-25 January 2013

The text companion of the #rbnews international show of 26 January 2013 is online. You can read it after the jump.

Boletim semanal da Grécia #2, 5 de janeiro de 2013

1. A lista Lagarde, um rol das grandes fortunas gregas que cometem evasão fiscal e que a ex-Ministra das Finanças francesa havia entregue ao ex-Ministro Grego de Finanças Giorgos Papakonstatinu, está se transformando em um grande escândalo. Tal lista passou pelas mãos de dois ministros e um primeiro-ministro, que conseguiram mantê-la em segredo até que o jornalista Kostas Vaxevanis publicou seu conteúdo: os nomes de mais de 2 mil depositantes gregos com contas na filial suíça do HSBC, que são suspeito de terem evadido divisas.

Agora os rumores dão conta de que a primeira versão da lista publicada contém um número de supostos fraudadores menor que a segunda e mais recente versão, lançando fortes suspeitas sobre o ex-ministro das Finanças Giorgos Papakonstantinu, que supostamente manipulou o conteúdo da lista para ocultar uma eventual evasão de divisas de seus familiares. Na sequência dessas revelações, 71 parlamentares gregos apresentaram no Parlamento um pedido de investigação contra o ex-Ministro de Finanças. Os deputados pertencem aos três partidos da coalizão do governo, mas nenhum líder de partido ratificou o pedido.

Facts and figures of "Lagarde List" in a nutshell

By @inflammatory_

The text below is an extract from this week’s issue of HOT DOC magazine featuring extensive report and commentary by editor Kostas Vaxevanis and his team, over the leaked “Lagarde List” published on Saturday in an extra edition.

In a nutshell

• ·        The 2,059 HSBC clients listed hold 2,846 accounts in total
• ·        Accounts make a total of €4,5 billion in deposits
• ·        55% of the accounts showed no transactions during 2005, 2006 and the first 2 months of 2007, apparently when Herve Falciani stole HSBC data. In February 2007, 26% of the accounts were active whilst the rest remained inactive, closed, abandoned, blocked or without sufficient data.
• ·        Swiss banks allow their customers to open an account in their name or alternatively in a code number. This is convenient for those seeking funds from controversial sources – as evidence shows from Tsochatzopoulos scandal too. For example a probe can be funded from a well known source to a numbered bank account whose holder cannot be identified. Later on in case a minister is inquired amid investigation, he may claim that this does not refer to a bank account but…a telephone number.  
• 
  
• ·        41% of “Lagarde List” accounts are opened in a name and the rest in a code preferably numerical in most cases.
• ·        Named/numbered, active/inactive accounts and their links with offshore companies are included in “Lagarde List”
• ·        81 account holders define themselves as company managers, 24 as ship owners, 43 as lawyers, 3 as public servants, 4 as journalists, 4 as publishers, 2 as employees in Ministry of Finance, 2 as workers in tax offices, 44 as industrial manufacturers , 9 as businessmen among others.
• ·        Kostas Vaxevanis underlined it was vague from the very beginning if the document included the full list of accounts or it was amended while it was passed on from “one hand to another”.
• ·        “We did not publish any sensitive data”, writes Kostas Vaxevanis. “We published a list showing that each of these 2,059 people had made transactions (we don’t know their legal status) with a bank. This is not sensitive data but it would have been in case we released the deposits amount (…) "Lagarde List" is not a series of sensitive info but rather a document. HOT DOC had made clear that those included were HSBC bank account holders not necessarily criminals. The discretion does not lie upon journalism research and it shouldn't actually. Hints of “people’s incrimination” stem from the two ministers' attitude who allowed rumors to be spread instead of providing all evidence and conduct a research upon the matter in hand.”
• ·        Kostas Vaxevanis continues: "A while ago newspaper “Ta Nea” released a list of names from arts/entertainment industry along with data from their tax declaration form. Admittedly this is sensitive data but prosecutors remained inactive although those people proceeded to public complaints. 

translated by @inflammatory_

#rbnews international show - 27 October 2012

Our guest on the #rbnews international weekly show today was Aris Chatzistefanou (@xstefanou), of Debtocracy and Catastroika fame. We discussed Golden Dawn, its links with the Greek police force, the many failures of Greek media to handle these issues and the publication of the Lagarde list" in Hot Doc magazine. The weekly news section is a little longer than usual, as there were many things to report this week.
You can listen to the podcast after the jump.

#rbnews international show - 06 October 2012

In the second #rbnews English-language show of this season covering the period 30 September-06 October 2012, we discussed the Lagarde list, the new austerity measures, the multiple detentions and arrests by the police and torture cases and upcoming events in Greece, as well as developments with regards to the financial crisis in other European countries. The podcast is available after the jump.