A judicial source said the list
reportedly containing the details of some 2,000 Greek account holders was
finally delivered to a special prosecutor by Stelios Stasinopoulos, the head of
Greece's economic crimes unit SDOE.
The discovery took almost a
week and the involvement of Greek intelligence and two former finance
ministers, some two years after the government is believed to have first
received it.
Former finance minister George
Papaconstantinou has said the list -- part of account data leaked by an HSBC
bank employee in Switzerland -- was passed on by France's then finance minister
Christine Lagarde in 2010.
Greek officials had long
maintained that the information had been illegally obtained and could not be
used to chase down potential tax dodgers.
Two weeks ago, deputy finance
minister George Mavraganis reiterated that the material was the fruit of
"industrial espionage" and would not be used.
But facing mounting anger
towards ongoing austerity cuts, Athens then reversed its position and Finance
Minister Yannis Stournaras said the government wanted to use the information --
if only it could be found.
"I first learned of its
existence from the newspapers," Stournaras told the Financial Times,
adding that if the economic crimes unit could not track the data down
"we'll ask our European partners for another copy."
The affair has spawned
sarcastic comments in Greek media.
"Everybody knew about the
names on the list," said top-selling daily Ta Nea, poking fun at the game
of "hide and seek" involving the missing data.
"No official, past of
present, is able to give a convincing answer on what has happened with this
evidence. But it is clear that checks were not carried out, when other
countries were able to deal major blows to tax evasion," Ta Nea said.
Supreme Court prosecutor Nikos
Pantelis on Tuesday told reporters that the material was eligible for use
"as it came from an official state representative through diplomatic
channels."
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