BERN, SWITZERLAND – Germany, the UK and now Italy: Switzerland’s southern neighbour is the latest to enter into talks with Bern over ways to get more of its citizens money into the taxman’s hands. A steering group has been set up and will meet for the first time 24 May to consider several financial and tax issues, but one of them has already been resolved: an outstanding payment of the “retrocession for cross-border commuters” has been resolved, says Bern, and the payment order in favour of Italy has been issued.
Widmer-Schlumpf and Monti to meet soon
The Federal Department of Finance and the Italian Ministry of Economy and Finance announced Wednesday 9 May that a working visit will soon take place between President Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf and the President of the Council of Ministers of of Italy, Mario Monti.
The announcement follows a working session in Bern Wednesday between State Secretary Michael Ambühl, head of the State Secretariat for International Financial Matters (SIF), and Italian Ambassador Carlo Baldocci, diplomatic adviser to the Italian Ministry of Economy and Finance.
The two “discussed various financial and tax issues. Also in light of the recent developments in the European Union, their discussions included the model for an agreement on the regularization of assets held in Switzerland by non-resident taxpayers and the introduction of a withholding tax on future investment income, as well as access to financial markets, existing black lists, the revision of the double taxation agreement (also with reference to the exchange of information) and the agreement regarding the taxation of cross-border commuters.”
Switzerland to share seat with Poland, pledges additional $10 billion to IMF
BERN, SWITZERLAND – Swiss President Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf and US Attorney General Eric Holder met on the fringes of a key International Monetary Fund (IMF) meeting in Washington 20-21 April. Bern’s statement was brief, noting that the two met “in order to discuss bilateral cooperation on tax issues. They agreed to pursue all available options to identify US taxpayers with undeclared accounts in Switzerland.” The US Department of Justice, which Holder heads, did not comment on the meeting.
The IMF received pledges of $430 billion in additional funds for what it calls a “reinforced anti-crisis firewall” from its member states, in an IMFC (Financial Committee) meeting of central bank governors and ministers 20-22 April. Switzerland pledged $10, noting that the “exceptional” boost is “due to the still fragile state of the world economy, [thus] the IMF ministerial committee decided to increase the IMF resources” and insisting that “the additional funds should be made available to the IMF only on a temporary basis.”
Poland and Switzerland to share part of Bretton Woods leadership
Poland and Switzerland, in a new Memorandum of Understanding signed during the Washington meetings, have agreed to Switzerland maintaining “overall leadership of the constituency in both the IMF and World Bank.” The constituency to which they refer is a group of eight IMF member countries that Switzerland has represented since 1992 on the 24-seat councils of the IMF and the World Bank, sister organizations in what are known as the Bretton Woods Institutions. “It will represent the constituency in the responsible ministerial bodies, for example, the IMFC and Development Committee, in which the political and strategic courses are set. However, Switzerland will share its seat on the IMF Executive Board–the IMF’s operating decision-making body–and in future both countries will nominate the executive director for a two-year period on an equal rotation basis.”
The clause concerning the executive director is dependent on the IMF implementing its governance reforms but Bern notes that no leadership changes will be made for the World Bank, where governance reform is not underway.
Police officers carry the coffin of one of the 28 victims of Sierre's coach crash to load it into a Belgian military cargo aircraft at Sion airport, western Switzerland, Friday, March 16, 2012. Twenty-eight people, including 22 children, returning to Belgium from a skiing holiday died in a bus accident inside a tunnel in Sierre in the Swiss canton of Valais. (©2012 KEYSTONE POOL/Olivier Maire)
GENEVA, SWITZERLAND – (#Belgium#Sierre bus crash) The bodies of the 28 people who died Tuesday 13 March in a bus crash in Sierre, canton Valais, were flown out of the small Sion airport Friday morning at 09:00.
The small white caskets contrasted sharply with the vivid blue skies and white peaks above as they were carried to two planes brought to Switzerland by the Belgian armed services.
A police honour guard escorted them and police officers, all of whom have been involved in the massive transport, security, identification, investigation and cleanup tasks following the accident, carried them to the planes.
Several of the officers were clearly trying to hold back tears.
Belgium mourns
Belgium is officially in mourning today, as the victims, 22 of the 28 children, were flown home.
Swiss President Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf is in Belgium today for meetings with European Union leaders.
In Sion and Sierre, police stood on several corners as ambulances discreetly moved patients between hospitals, with eight of the children taken to the Sion airport to fly home in a third plane provided by Belgium.
The tunnel in Sierre, in the direction of Martigny-Lausanne, remains closed for now.
(Click on images to view larger)
Police carrying coffin to the plane at Sion airport, for the return flight to Belgium (©2012 KEYSTONE POOL/Olivier Maire)
Photos from Sion, Switzerland in canton Valais Friday morning 16 March 2012
 ©2012 KEYSTONE POOL/Olivier Maire |  ©2012 KEYSTONE POOL/Olivier Maire |
 ©2012 KEYSTONE POOL/Olivier Maire |  ©2012 KEYSTONE POOL/Olivier Mair |
 ©2012 KEYSTONE POOL/Olivier Maire |  ©2012 KEYSTONE POOL/Olivier Maire |
Reminder: tax deadline 15 March
100 years to pay off mortgages may be less popular if bank interest is no longer a tax deduction
BERN, SWITZERLAND – The Swiss government is reviewing the tax deductions citizens with mortgages receive, with Finance Minister and President Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf working on ending these, Tages-Anzeiger reported Tuesday 13 March.
The deductions are keeping Swiss household debt high, the president is reported to believe, because they discourage the Swiss from paying off the principal on their mortgages; 100-year mortgages were long a banking tradition in Switzerland.
She has reportedly formed a working committee to review the situation, that includes Thomas Jordanof the Swiss National Bank and Patrick Raaflaub from the bank supervisory body Finma, but Bern has not confirmed the information.
A change would most likely also include an end to a tax on the rental value of property, the newspaper reports.
Reminder to Swiss residents: The deadline for filing 2011 Swiss taxes is 15 March for canton Vaud and 31 March in Geneva.
Swiss Parliament, Bern
BERN, SWITZERLAND – The lower house of the Swiss parliament Monday 5 March voted strongly in favour of an amended US-Swiss tax treaty, 116-52, thus backing a vote by the upper house in December 2011.
Some foreign media coverage of the vote implies that the treaty is designed to help out 11 Swiss banks under investigation by the US Justice Department for illegally assisting Americans in the US to hide money offshore from the IRS, the tax arm of the US.
But the treaty was in fact agreed to in June 2011 by both governments. Credit Suisse announced in June 2011 that it was being investigated by the US Department of Justice and the cantonal bank in Basel nearly a year ago, while other banks, whose names were announced only in January 2012, apparently became aware of the investigations late in 2011.
The revised treaty grew out of negotiations that had been going on since the 2009 debacle where the Swiss government approved UBS turning over data on thousands of bank clients as part of a deal with the US.
The death of banking secrecy greatly exaggerated?
The right-wing UDC has been vocal in opposing the treaty, arguing that it signals the death of banking secrecy and is financial suicide, while some Swiss-German media have been making dire predictions for months, often reported as news from unnamed sources, about the impact of such a vote. Both have been picked up widely outside Switzerland as a sign that the treaty signals the end of banking secrecy, a view not held by many middle of the road politicians and the government, as well as the Bankers Association, which 22 February came out in favour of a regulation that would require offshore banking clients to make tax self-declarations. RTS, public broadcasting, says there has been a significant shift in banking secrecy since 2009, but Switzerland continues to support it as part of a broader respect for privacy. Today’s vote, it notes, should allow US-Swiss talks over American investigations into Swiss banks to move ahead.
The treaty is designed to replace a 1996 treaty, currently in effect. Both provide for judicial assistance in cases of tax fraud, but the new treaty defines the framework for this more precisely and admits tax evasion as well as fraud, in some cases, as grounds for a request for assistance.
Tax evasion is a crime, but not a penal offense in Switzerland, whose list of allowable tax deductions is far shorter than those of the IRS, and evasion has until now not been accepted as grounds for assistance.
New agreement amended in November
The June agreement was amended in November after a parliamentary commission recommended, 7-3, that this addition be made: it allows for group requests covering several financial accounts to be made together and, significantly, bank data could be given to US authorities without the US first providing a name and account number, although this assistance would be provided in a very limited number of cases. The change was initially expected to face stiff opposition in Parliament, but in the end it passed with a strong majority.
Switzerland and the US have been discussing, in separate talks, the case of the 11 Swiss banks under investigation by the US Department of Justice. The Swiss government in late January approved the delivery of coded bank data to the US as a goodwill gesture, with President Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf noting that the data could be decoded once the two countries reach a “global agreement”: “We will only decode when we have found a solution with the United States on all the banks that are under discussion.”
UK, Germany should revise part of agreements with Swiss, says EU tax head
European Union Tax Commissioner Algirdas Semeta said in a letter to Denmark’s prime minister 5 March that the UK and Germany will need to revise part of the tax agreements they have negotiated with Switzerland since last summer. Bloomberg reports that “when countries make bilateral tax agreements with other nations, EU policy calls for them to leave out any areas covered by a common European framework, Semeta said. In the case of savings income, the bloc has existing information-exchange rules and is working on additional measures related to interest payments, ownership stakes and the 27-nation EU’s relationship with Switzerland, he said.”
Semeta’s remarks were more positive than earlier EU threats to sue Switzerland for working out bilateral deals with two of its member countries.
Background story, GenevaLunch, “Swiss government raises the ante for banks, other countries”, 22 February 2012
Swiss media, political reaction won’t comfort Wegelin
ZURICH, SWITZERLAND – Wegelin, Switzerland’s oldest private wealth management bank 2 February became the first bank outside the United States to be charged with fraud by the US Department of Justice (DOJ). It has been summoned to appear in a US District Court in Manhattan, New York 10 February.
The bank, which has no US offices, announced 27 January that it was, for business purposes, closing its doors, after selling off the bulk of its business, all non-US business, to Swiss bank Raiffeisen. It said in a statement last week that “Wegelin & Co. Private Bankers will remain in existence to finalize the closure of all remaining US client relationships and to continue the negotiations with the US justice authorities.”
The DOJ announced, in a long and detailed press release, that the bank “was indicted today for conspiring with US taxpayers and others to hide more than $1.2 billion in secret accounts and the income these accounts generated from the Internal Revenue Service (IRS).” The Justice Department announcement (read in full) 2 February notes that “This is the first time an overseas bank has been charged by the United States for facilitating tax fraud by US taxpayers.”
Several Swiss media and political figures responded to the detailed charges against the bank with astonishment that after the 2008 UBS debacle other Swiss banks could have taken the risk and flirted with breaking Swiss law in their attempts to woo former UBS American residents. TSR carries several video and audio clips, including an interview with Geneva legal specialist Marc Henzelin, who points out that there are far more “transactions” or deals in the US legal system than in Switzerland and the bank’s representatives must now start their negotiations. Politicians heading into a meeting with the Swiss Federal Council Friday were critical of Wegelin’s behaviour.
Bank used secretive methods to woo clients, says DOJ
Preet Bharara, US Attorney for the Southern District of New York, is cited in the DOJ statement: “As alleged, Wegelin Bank aided and abetted US taxpayers who were in flagrant violation of the tax code.” In particular, it is accused of using secretive methods to obtain former UBS clients after Switzerland’s largest bank paid a fine to the US and stopped servicing US-domiciled Americans in 2008.
The undeclared money was held in Wegelin accounts belonging to 100 US taxpayers, people domiciled in the US, according to the indictment, which covers the bank’s activities from 2002 to 2011.
A second indictment was filed against the bank and three employees, all residing in Switzerland: “Wegelin is charged in a superseding indictment with Michael Berlinka, Urs Frei and Roger Keller, three client advisers at the bank”, the result of Wegelin using its correspondent bank UBS to issue payments to US-based clients. Government officials seized $16 million in Wegelin’s correspondent account at UBS in Connecticut as a result of that indictment.
The trio face up to “five years in prison, a maximum term of three years of supervised release and a fine of the greatest of $250,000, or twice the gross gain derived from the offense or twice the gross loss to the victims”, according to the Department of Justice Tax Office. They have not been arrested, the indictment points out.
Warfare vs negotiations
The story is being widely covered by major US and financial media, which have mainly republished the DOJ announcement, including Bloomberg and the New York Times. Reuters writer Lynnley Browning, who frequently covers Swiss banking and US tax issues, often citing a source in the US government, has added a number of details from the indictment itself. She characterizes the ongoing Swiss-US double taxation treaty negotiations as a “row”: “On Tuesday, the Swiss finance ministry handed US authorities encrypted data on bank employees who served US clients suspected of dodging taxes, and said it would only provide the key to decipher the data once the row was settled.”
Swiss President Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf told a parliamentary tax commission that one part of the negotiations involves finding a “global solution” to charges against an additional 10 banks, including Credit Suisse.
Swiss president continues to seek “lasting solution” to avoid continually digging up the past
She met with US Secretary of the Treasury Timothy Geithner in Davos last week and said afterwards that she had made clear “Switzerland’s concern for a lasting solution to be found in the tax dispute with the USA.” She told Swiss media after Davos that both countries are interested in finding a solution that will end recurrent US investigations into Swiss banks. “We’re investing a lot of time in finding a solution, as are the Americans, and sometimes we move ahead and sometimes we aren’t able to, but we now must find a solution. I don’t want to find us, every year, discussing all over again how to resolve problems from the past.”
Martin Naville, head of the Swiss-American Chamber of Commerce, on Swiss television over the weekend rebutted media attempts to profile that talks as warfare. “We are in a process of negotiations, not at war,” noting that Switzerland’s move to hand the US encrypted data is a normal part of negotiations, where “you have to give something from time to time.”
TSR report, Fr
Update: we have had to remove the video from this page because of a TSR technical problem that made the sound come on automatically if GenevaLunch opened on your screen; our apologies for the inconvenience.
BERN, SWITZERLAND – Data privacy concern is increasingly raising its head in US-Swiss talks over taxes, visas and banking. The latest incident is linked to Switzerland’s decision to continue participating in the US visa waiver programme.
Parliament will have its say in US data demands for visa waiver programme
The Swiss Federal Council Wednesday 1 February made it clear it intends to move ahead with negotiations with the US in order to remain in the US visa waiver programme. Switzerland has been part of the programme since 1986 but in October 2009 the US announced that partners in the programme would have to observe two new rules, says Bern. They were told that “partner countries will be required to increase police cooperation. This will entail the conclusion of agreements about the automatic exchange of DNA and fingerprint data to prevent and to combat serious crime (PCSC) and the exchange of data about known and suspected terrorists.”
Swiss media and politicians have been speculating in recent weeks that the US has been pressuring the Swiss government to agree to the new rules and that, given Switzerland’s penchant for privacy and data protection, the Swiss government would refuse. Some 340,000 Swiss travel to the US every year and the visa waiver programme means they can visit as a tourist for up to three months without first obtaining a visa.
But Bern now says it plans to go ahead with the negotiations, noting, however, its own ground rules. The US “requires that two agreements in the security area should be finalized. The Federal Council has instructed the Federal Department of Justice and Police (FDJP) to formulate a negotiation mandate in this area. Parliament and the Cantons will be consulted before the final granting of the mandate. Data protection aspects will be duly taken into account in the negotiation of the agreements.”
Double taxation treaty talks bring up data release questions
Bern gives green light to send thousands of e-mails, but they remain encrypted
The sensitive issue comes up just as the lower house of parliament’s tax commission announced, 31 January, that Swiss President and Finance Minister, Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf had brought it up to date on US-Swiss double taxation treaty negotiations. Details were not provided except to say that the discussion covered interpretations of “judicial assistance”, a sticking point in the negotiations, and “recent demands by the US”, without elaborating on these.
Swiss-German public radio DSR reported, however, that some 4 to 6 million e-mails, mainly correspondence about banks’ commercial affairs, were being offered to the US by at least some of the 11 banks currently under investigation by the US Department of Justice—but that the correspondance is encrypted and will not be decrypted until the two countries reach an agreement. The e-mails contain the names of client advisers. The banks are suspected by the US government of helping US citizens evade taxes.
Encryption until “global solution” found
Spokesperson Roland Meier of the Federal Finance Department then confirmed to journalists the information published by DSR. He noted that until a “global solution” is found with American judicial authorities, names that are encrypted may not be released unless a legal request is made to Swiss authorities, repeating what Widmer-Schlumpf said on television, “We will only decode when we have found a solution with the United States on all the banks that are under discussion.”
A legal request would need to respect the existing Swiss-US treaty and specifically state that the actions of the person whose information is being requested is punishable under both Swiss and US law. Details, TSR, French
Analysis, in French: Martin Naville, president of the Swiss-American Chamber of Commerce, analyzed the situation in a video interview with RSR radio, “Les choses ont changé” (6 minutes, free but registration required)
Switzerland’s vocal Americans joined by even louder Canadians
Americans in Switzerland, meanwhile, are expressing growing concern about their ability to maintain bank accounts for their daily living expenses, mortgages and pensions, with Swiss banks growing more wary of them as clients given US demands for information. A particular sticking point is the Fatca (Foreign Account Tax Compliance Act) law that starting in 2014 will penalize financial institutions around the world that don’t comply by revealing the accounts of US persons to the IRS and collect tax withholdings for the IRS from them.
Switzerland’s Americans were some of the first US citizens abroad to become aware of the problem, because of Swiss data protection issues and US efforts to obtain information from Swiss banks. But Americans living in Canadai are becoming increasingly vocal in their resistance to US efforts to obtain data. The larger US expat community in Canada recently formed the Isaac Brock Society, named after Sir Isaac Brock, who prepared Canadians for war with the United States and gave his life in repelling a US invasion in 1812, according to their site.
TSR Wednesday evening ran an interview with Kashya Hildebrand from Italian TV, where she apologized to Switzerland and her husband
BERN / ZURICH, SWITZERLAND – Swiss political and economic circles were still abuzz Wednesday 11 January with the fallout from the resignation Monday of Philipp Hildebrand as chairman of the Swiss National Bank. New developments:
- the Swiss president came in for criticism for her strong backing of Hildebrand but defended herself, saying she was expressing the view of the Federal Council last Friday
- the selection process for a new bank head got underway
- Hildebrand’s contractual pay package was made public – under the terms of his contract he will continue to receive his annual salary for one year, which was CHF994,800 in 2010; he cannot work for a bank during the next six months, or 12 months in the case of the big banks, under SNB rules
- Thomas Jordan, appointed interim chairman until a new head is found, has made it clear he will maintain the CHF1.20/euro cap on the Swiss franc and continuity appears to be guiding bank policy for now
- Hildebrand’s wife Kashya, interviewed by Reuters in Singapore at an art fair, ended some speculation by saying that she had the idea for the currency exchange so it is her fault but yes, they are still happily married.
BERN, SWITZERLAND – The Swiss Migration Office’s current backlog of some 3,000 applications must be completed and applications brought up to date by 2013, former Swiss Federal Judge Michel Féraud concluded as part of his final report on applications for asylum in Switzerland.
But the most damning part of his report covers applications from Iraqis at the Swiss embassies in Egypt and Syria, from 2006 to 2008: the judge writes that a Swiss Justice and Police Department decision in November 2006 to not handle the applications was not in line with procedures defined by law, and it violated constitutional guarantees.
Rigid system contributed to decision to ignore applications, backlog
His report implies that the blame lies with the rigidity of the legal situation, according to a Federal Council statement issued 11 January: all Swiss embassies are required to accept and handle asylum applications, although they are not equipped, in terms of staffing, to do so. The applicants, had they been turned down by Switzerland, would not have been obliged to return to Iraq, since they had been accepted by Egypt and Syria.
One of the debates that was taking place at the time was how to better distinguish between legitimate asylum seekers and migrants. The number of asylum seekers grew steadily from the 1970s, federal statistics show, and the resident asylum population peaked at some 105,000 in 1999. The number of applicants has been in the range of about 10-15,000 annually for the past decade just under 11,000 in 2007, with 15,567 applicants in 2011.
UNHCR (UN High Commissioner for Refugees) figures published in November show that the decline in applications for asylum occurred worldwide, not just in Switzerland, from 2000 to 2010.
Judge not suggesting legal pursuit
Féraud notes that, given the lapse of time and the Federal Council’s stated desire in 2010 to make the regulations less rigid, thus giving embassies more discretion in handling cases, he is not recommending disciplinary action. His investigation did not turn up any acts of wrongdoing such as overstepping the bounds of their authority on the part of government employees.
Blocher headed department in 2005, successors unaware of decision
Christoph Blocher was the federal councilor with responsibility for the Justice and Police Department at the time; his right-wing UDC People’s Party came in for heavy criticism inside and outside Switzerland in 2006 for posters seen to be racist, as the party campaigned to reduce the number of immigrants.
Blocher was succeeded as head of the department by Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf after he lost his seat on the council in December 2007, but neither Widmer-Schlumpf nor her successor as minister with responsibility for the federal office, Simonetta Sommaruga, were informed of the Iraqi applications and the decision to ignore them.
The report was requested by the Federal Council in August 2011 when it was made aware that the applications had not been dealt with for a number of years.
Féraud filed it 22 December and the Federal Council 11 January acknowledged publicly that it had received and is considering the report.
Economy minister Johann Schneider-Ammann re-elected
UDC now fighting for Calmy-Rey’s seat, its last chance to add a party member to the council
Doris Leuthard, first Swiss gov't member re-elected, by large majority, 14 December 2011
11:30 BERN, SWITZERLAND – The last of 7 seats on the federal council is the focus of a tough fight between the Socialists and UDC parties, with the UDC arguing that Switzerland’s balance of power calls for its candidate, Jean-François Rime, to be given the seat. In the first round of voting, Alain Berset took the lead with nearly twice as many votes as his opponents, but without the necessary majority. The 31-year-old economist from Fribourg is the youngest member of the upper house.
Doris Leuthard and Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf were re-elected easily as the first two of seven seats for the ruling Federal Council, the Swiss government (also sometimes referred to as the cabinet) were assigned by parliament. Ueli Maurer, Didier Burkhalter and Simonetta Sommaruga were re-elected in the minutes that followed.
Leuthard, who is minister for the economy, had 216 votes (114 needed for an absolute majority) while Widmer-Schlumpf, finance minister, had 131 (absolute majority: 120). The latter’s split from the national UDC party angered it in 2007, when she was elected and leader Christoph Blocher was not, and her re-election today, with the two UDC candidates receiving far fewer votes.
The UDC is now attacking the final two seats with just one of its two official candidates, Jean-François Rime. Given the UDC’s strongly conservative stance on the economy and foreign affairs, the seats are hotly contested.
Swiss President Micheline Calmy-Rey, who has been a member of the Federal Council for seven years, gave her farewell speech Wednesday morning. The 66-year-old Socialist is retiring from political office, although she told journalists two weeks ago that she has no intention of dropping off the political scene.
The Swiss presidency rotates among the council members, who serve in the role for one year.
The order of votes for the seven council seats are based on time in office:
Swiss Federal Council (cabinet), 2010
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Switzerland’s cabinet, the seven-member Swiss Federal Council, which governs as a body of equals, has published its official photo for 2010. Left to right: Didier Burkhalter, the chancellor for the Swiss Confederation Corina Casanova, Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf, Ueli Maurer, Micheline Calmy-Rey, Hans-Rudolf Merz, Swiss President Doris Leuthard, Vice-president Moritz Leuenberger. The presidency is a one-year rotating position, while the chancellor’s job is to oversee the smooth functioning of the administrative side of the government.
Keeping the door open to dialogue
Update 23 December 07:55 Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Switzerland’s Muslim community and the Swiss minister in charge of the Federal Department of Justice and Police met Monday 21 December to discuss the implications of the recent vote to ban new minarets. Federal councilor Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf told the group that Bern is determined to improve relations with the Muslim community. A first meeting took place in September, before the vote.
The government and three representative Muslim organizations have agreed to meet again, this time to analyze the situation and to discuss concrete measures.
Federal Councilor Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – Switzerland’s Justice and Police minister Thursday called on voters to reject the anti-minaret proposal which will be put to them in a referendum 29 November, saying that it is unconstitutional and runs counter to Swiss values. Eveline Widmer Schlumpf told a press conference that the proposal, from the right-wing UDC of which she was once a member, does not respect Switzerland’s freedom of religious expression. She argues that this means not only that people are free to hold religious beliefs, but also to express them openly and publicly in appropriate places of worship.
Bern, Switzerland (GenevaLunch) – The Swiss federal council has agreed to hold back on the destruction of documents related to the St. Gallen family Tinner, allegedly implicated in an international nuclear proliferation network. In an agreement with the Control Commission Delegation (CD), the Swiss parliament’s investigative branch for national security issues, Justice minister Eveline Widmer-Schlumpf, agreed to allow certain of the documents to be made available to the judicial investigation and for the Tinner family defense attorneys.
