The Austrian Kurz Government accused of Corruption! Raid on the home of the finance minister. Italy involved
The perfect pro-European government of the young Austrian Chancellor Kurz is a little less perfect and risks big problems, as reported by the Financial Times. A corruption investigation that had already been rumored for some time reached the highest levels of government last Thursday, when a team of police from the anti-fraud department, accompanied by financial experts, broke into the home of the country's finance minister, Gernot. Blümel.
Blümel is now the key suspect in an investigation linking corruption in the Austrian government with a gambling company, Novomatic .
Blümel is a figure very close to that of Prime Minister Kurz, and the finance minister mentions him 23 times. At the same time Kurz called BluMel 42 times, so the investigations risk extending to the young leader of the Popolari, very active at European level.
The case comes to involve Italy. Blümel in 2017 would have been the link between Kurz, at that time foreign minister, and Novomatic, which wanted to pressure the Italian government to grant a tax rebate of 40 million by the government of Rome. In exchange for these pressures, the company was ready to politically support Kurz's party.
The Austrian prime minister was caught off guard by this new scandal. An Austrian political expert said: “This investigation has become a huge obstacle for the government” “Blümel is really very close [to Kurz]. It is the inner circle. . . The last six weeks have been very difficult. "
Right now both Blumer and Novomatic deny that there has been any money exchange, but investigations are spreading to the small consulting firms and foundations surrounding the government.
The year began for the Kurz government with the resignation of its labor minister in an embarrassing plagiarism scandal. Data meanwhile showed that the economy is among the hardest hit in Europe by the pandemic. Finally, in early February, an overwhelming official investigation pointed to the Austrian secret services as ineffective in preventing the terrorist attacks of last October.
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The article The Austrian Kurz Government accused of Corruption! Raid on the home of the finance minister. Involved Italy comes from ScenariEconomici.it .
This is a machine translation of a post published on Scenari Economici at the URL https://scenarieconomici.it/il-governo-austriaco-kurz-sotto-accusa-per-corruzione-raid-a-casa-del-ministro-delle-finanze-coinvolta-litalia/ on Thu, 18 Feb 2021 08:36:05 +0000.