As of: January 29, 2024, 2:45 p.m
Comments
Press
Split
Files are on the table before a trial in a regional court.
© Swen Pförtner/dpa/Symbolbild
Influencing one's own image and decisions in a Council of Europe body: To this end, Azerbaijan's government is said to have relied on bribery of parliamentarians.
There are now charges against two former CDU/CSU MPs.
Munich/Karlsruhe - Charges have been brought against two former CDU members of the Bundestag due to bribery allegations in the wake of the so-called Azerbaijan affair.
The Munich Public Prosecutor's Office announced on Monday that ex-CDU parliamentarian Axel Fischer from the Karlsruhe-Land constituency was suspected of bribery, and former CSU MP Eduard Lintner from Lower Franconia of bribery of elected officials.
The aim of the payments was to influence decisions in favor of Azerbaijan in the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe (PACE).
According to the investigators, Lintner, who sat in the Bundestag for 33 years and in the PACE until 2010, is said to have received "an amount several million through 19 foreign letterbox companies" through two companies by 2016.
He is said to have forwarded some of these to other MPs who were supposed to influence decisions in Azerbaijan's interests.
According to investigators, Fischer, who was active as EPP group leader in PACE from 2010 to 2018, is said to have given positive speeches in the interests of Azerbaijan and forwarded confidential documents at an early stage.
For this he is said to have received a bribe of 21,800 euros in 2016.
Influencing has only been punishable since 2014
According to the public prosecutor's office, the indictment concerns payments made since September 2014. Since then, influencing the activities of members of the parliamentary assemblies of international organizations such as PACE has been punishable in Germany.
Lintner calls allegations “big nonsense”
Lintner described the suspicion of bribery to the German Press Agency in Munich on Monday as “big nonsense”.
After his time as a member of parliament, he worked as a lobbyist to ensure that the Nagorno-Karabakh conflict region was assigned to Azerbaijan - from his point of view “a correct situation under international law”.
The government there also paid money to his companies for this.
But he didn't bribe other members of parliament with it.
Azerbaijan and Armenia have been fighting over Nagorno-Karabakh since the collapse of the Soviet Union.
While the region, inhabited by a majority of Armenians, was able to break away from Baku in a bloody civil war in the 1990s with the help of Yerevan, the authoritarian-ruled Azerbaijan managed to take revenge in 2020.
In the ceasefire agreement, Azerbaijan secured control over two-thirds of the territory of Nagorno-Karabakh.
But the ceasefire was fragile and Azerbaijan began another offensive in September 2023, and the defeated Karabakh Armenians surrendered just a day later.
Fischer told the dpa on Monday that the allegations against him “are not true, they only serve to prejudge.”
He was “so happy that after three years the public prosecutor’s office is finally presenting their papers to the court and stating what I am supposed to have done.”
The procedure is “not only stressful and dangerous for my family and especially for my children, but it is also destroying my professional and social life.”
Both defendants are presumed innocent until convicted.
My news
dm boss agrees with Wolfgang Grupp on controversial statement
Weather forecast for February in Baden-Württemberg kipptlesen
Student (18) killed: situation surrounding ex-boyfriend was considered calm - read “There is no such thing as 100% security”.
Trigema touches online reading with an emotional video by Wolfgang Grupp and his wife
Amusement park in Baden-Württemberg will open a world first in 2024
Seven districts in Baden-Württemberg where most millionaires live read
Investigations lasted several years
According to its own information, the public prosecutor's office has brought charges against two other defendants who are primarily accused of aiding and abetting - for example by making contact or processing payments.
Another former member of the CDU/CSU, who was in the meantime under investigation for bribery, has now died.
The Munich Higher Regional Court will decide whether there will be a trial after the indictment.
The investigation dragged on for years.
There had already been searches at Lintner's house in 2020, and the following year the Federal Criminal Police Office searched Fischer's parliamentary office in the Bundestag.
The public prosecutor's office said the investigation was very complex and time-consuming because of the "conspiratorial actions of the accused".
Numerous properties were also searched abroad.
A total of around 15 orders or requests for legal assistance were made, including to Cyprus, Liechtenstein, Belgium, Estonia, Latvia and Azerbaijan as well as to Switzerland and Turkey.
The chairwoman of Transparency Germany, Alexandra Herzog, described the indictment as a bang.
“We are curious to see whether there will be a conviction given the porous law against bribery of members of parliament,” said Herzog on Monday.
“Today’s news makes it clear once again that Germany must better arm itself against the danger of influence exerted by autocratically led states through strategic corruption.” dpa