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German local government confirms new stolen data offered, Swiss president confirms Germany bought first batch

Swiss politician might consider reconsidering Swiss banking secrecy, some hint

Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – The saga of data stolen from Swiss banks and offered to the German government continues, with new wrinkles to the story. A German newspaper will publish an article Saturday, reports Swiss television TSR, stating that a new batch of stolen data, with 2,000 client names, is being offered to a regional German government. The government of Bade-Wurtemberg has confirmed the information.

Meanwhile, Swiss President Doris Leuthard told reporters as she came out of a meeting that Switzerland will likely ask for a copy of the first batch of stolen data. Switzerland did the same with data stolen from a Geneva branch of British bank HSBC and sold to the French government. The data will allow Switzerland to see if requests for judicial assistance from France, and perhaps now from Germany, are based on information obtained from the stolen files. If this is the case, Switzerland will refuse to provide assistance because of the illegal source of the information.

Switzerland and Germany have confirmed this week that they are slowly, steadily continuing to negotiate a new bilateral double taxation agreement.

One of the results of this, according to Le Temps newspaper, is that the question of the viability of Swiss banking secrecy is no longer a taboo political issue.

Thieves to be prosecuted once identity known

The man who stole the HSBC data, Hervé Falciani, is being pursued by the Swiss government for his criminal behaviour under Swiss law, but given that France does not extradite its own citizens for crimes committed elsewhere, he, like French-Polish filmmaker Roman Polanski, is unlikely to find himself arrested, as long as he stays in France. The identity of the thief of the first batch of data stolen and offered to Germany is not yet known, say the Swiss, but they will press criminal charges once this is known, the government says.

Foreign minister’s remarks were poorly translated, Swiss president insists

Leuthard also took a minute with journalists to insist that the Federal Council is unanimous in its stance on Germany buying the stolen data. She insisted in particular that the media misinterpreted, literally, remarks made Wednesday night 3 February by Swiss Minister Micheline Calmy-Rey. Earlier Friday it appeared that the government was gently massaging Calmy-Rey’s comments, to soften their impact.

Foreign Minister Calmy-Rey, a Socialist and president of Switzerland in 2009, upset right-leaning members of the Swiss political scene when she said at a debate hosted by Swiss German publication Die Zeit that “If I were the finance minister I would have bought the bank client data.” [Ed. note: the French original was "Comme ministre des Finances, j'aurais moi aussi acheté les données des clients des banques"]. She added that every finance minister is fighting tax evasion, so that’s a normal reaction.

But Friday morning the council, of which she is a member, and which normally presents a unified front on issues, explained that she had meant if she were minister, she would need to reflect on the possibility of buying the data. The official government stance, stated Monday, is that Germany would be wrong to buy stolen data, that such a theft is a crime in Switzerland and that Germany and Switzerland must respect each other’s laws.

Links to other sites: Le Temps (Fre), TSR (Fre)