ATHENS — The Greek police arrested and then quickly released the owner
and editor of a respected investigative magazine on Sunday morning hours
after he published a list of more than 2,000 Greeks who were said to
have accounts at a bank in Switzerland, throwing new controversy into a
scandal over whether the government is actively pursuing suspected tax
cheats.
Alexandros Beltes/European Pressphoto Agency
Kostas Vaxevanis, center, publisher of the Greek
magazine Hot Doc, exited the prosecutor's office in Athens on Sunday.
The dramatic moves, which tens of thousands of Greeks were following on the Internet, came days before Greece’s
European partners were to meet to decide whether to grant tens of
billions of euros in new aid to the financially struggling nation.
Greece’s lenders have long said that the government must crack down on
tax evasion to be eligible for more aid.
The police said they had been ordered to take the editor, Kostas
Vaxevanis, who runs Hot Doc magazine and who is one of the nation’s most
famous investigative journalists, into custody on misdemeanor charges.
The Greek news media reported that the charges concerned the violation
of the privacy of those on the list.
Mr. Vaxevanis posted a message to his Twitter account early Sunday
saying that 15 officers had surrounded the home of a friend with whom he
had been staying “like Greek storm troopers in German uniforms.”
Mr. Vaxevanis soon followed up with another Twitter message: “They’re
entering my house with the
prosecutor right now. They are arresting me.
Spread the word.”
Hours later, he was released from Athens police headquarters to loud
cheers from a crowd outside. He is to face a magistrate at noon on
Monday, when his trial date is to be set.
On the list were a former culture minister, several employees of the
Finance Ministry and a number of business leaders. Hot Doc reported that
they had accounts in a Geneva branch of HSBC. The magazine said its
list matched a list of 2,059 people that was handed over to the Greek
government in 2010 by Christine Lagarde, then the French finance
minister and now the head of the International Monetary Fund, to help
Greece crack down on rampant tax evasion as it was trying to steady its
economy.
A spokesman for Ms. Lagarde referred questions to the French tax
authorities, who did not immediately respond to requests for comment.
Last week, as the controversy grew, two former ministers were pressed to
explain why the government appeared to have taken no action on the list
in the two years since Ms. Lagarde handed it over.
George Papaconstantinou, the ex-finance minister who received the list
from Ms. Lagarde, told a parliamentary panel last week that he had been
advised that he could not use it because a former HSBC employee obtained
the names illegally. Mr. Papaconstantinou said that after receiving the
names, he had passed them on a memory stick to the chief of Greece’s
financial crimes unit, Ioannis Diotis, who later gave it to Mr.
Papaconstantinou’s successor, Evangelos Venizelos, the current leader of
the Socialists. Mr. Diotis said that Mr. Venizelos had not instructed
him to investigate it.
Mr. Vaxevanis’s publication of the list raises the stakes in a heated
battle over which current and former government officials had seen the
original — and whether they had used it to check for possible tax
evasion.
Moreover, Mr. Vaxevanis’s arrest raises questions about freedom of the
press in a country that frequently reminds its European Union partners
that it is the birthplace of democracy. The Greek chapter of Reporters
Without Borders issued a statement on Sunday expressing concern about
the speed of his arrest.
Mr. Vaxevanis “is not a dangerous criminal,” the group said. “The
pressure created by the arrest of a reporter is clearly
disproportionate. This procedure simply encourages an excessive
cover-up, and the authorities appear to be imposing the ‘therapy’ of
this sensitive issue, which is a gripping matter of public interest.”
The group added that the handling of Mr. Vaxevanis’s case “cannot be any
different in a member state of the European Union.”
Mr. Vaxevanis said he was the wrong target. “Instead of arresting the
tax evaders and the ministers who had the list in their hands, they are
trying to arrest the truth and free journalism,” he said in a telephone
interview that was uploaded on the Internet and widely circulated.
Greek blogs posted petitions calling for Mr. Vaxevanis’s release, and
they had generated more than 10,000 online signatures by early
afternoon.
Greeks are skeptical that political leaders will investigate the
business elite, with whom they often have close ties, even as middle-
and lower-class people have struggled with higher taxes and increasingly
ardent tax collectors. Parliament is expected to vote on a new 13.5
billion euro austerity package (about $17.5 billion) that could further
reduce standards of living.
The fallout over the publication of the list is certain to distract
Greek politicians, and may raise fresh questions among Greece’s European
partners during a week when European finance ministers are scheduled to
discuss the release of a 31.5 billion euro loan tranche (about $41
billion) that Athens needs to avoid bankruptcy. The magazine was careful
to note that having an account at HSBC was not illegal or proof of
evading Greek taxes, a point underscored by a spokesman for the Finance
Ministry. But the magazine suggested that Greek officials should check
whether those on the list had moved money into the accounts to escape
paying taxes.
The existence of the list has shaken the country, posing new challenges
to the fragile three-way coalition government of Prime Minister Antonis
Samaras. There was no immediate comment from Mr. Samaras, who was
meeting with aides to discuss the new austerity measures.
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