Austrian journalists who reported on the Hypo Alpe Adria bank scandal could be put on trial in absentia in Munich, Germany, in spite of the fact that they did not violate any laws in Austria, law expert Maria Windhager has said.
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Five journalists from Austria are being charged by Munich state prosecutors for quoting directly from court files, something that is allowed in Austria but that is prohbitied in Germany.
The journalists were summoned for illegal interrogations by Austrian state prosecutors following a request from their Munich counterparts but a public outcry forced the the process to be stopped and the Justice Minister Dr Claudia Bandion-Ortner to admit “a mistake” had occurred.
It is not clear if the Munich prosecutor will pursue the charges and put the Austrian journalists on trial in abenstia in Germany, or what the consequences will be. Any such trial could result in the arrest of the journalists in Austria or in a ban from their entering Germany, Windhager indicated.
High ranking political figures from Austria, Germany and Croatia are implicated in the Hypo Alpe Adria scandal, including former Bavaria Prime Minister Edmund Stoiber and far right Austrian leader Jörg Haider
The illegal interrogations of the journalists has sparked fears of an unprecedented crackdown on the press in Austria.
The case also raises interesting issues relating to whether journalists can more easily be summoned for interrogations or tried in absentia for violating laws in other European countries in future.
High ranking political figures from Austria, Germany and Croatia are implicated in the Hypo Alpe Adria scandal, including former Bavaria Prime Minister Edmund Stoiber and far right Austrian leader Jörg Haider.
There is strong evidence the Hypo Alpe Adria bank fiddled its books to include toxic loans and so have a pretext to declare itself insolvent, withdraw money from circulation, help crash the economy, push up brankurptcies, seize assets as collateral for unpaid „debts“ and then suck tax payers cash by getting allies in government to give proper, real money in return for the worhtless, paper, fractional reserve banking funny money debts through various influsions under the cover of „nationalisation“.
As Austrians and Germans have to pay an ever higher proprotion of their taxes over to the „natioanlised“ banks for these fraudulent paper debts, politicians and bankers clearly fear that the population may find out the true facts about the scam, and have decided to launch an unprecedented persecution of journalists with the help of allies in the justice system.
Five journalists from Profil, News and Wirtschaftsblatt in total were involved in the illegal interrogations by the Vienna and Munich state prosecutors.
Iceland is the only country so far to have filed charges against a leading politician for his role in allowing funny money, paper fraud debts to be placed on banks balance sheets and used to implode the country’s economy and to aloow banks to suck tax payer money and capital.
Geir Haarde was indicted on Tuesday with failing to provent the banking cricis that almost destroyed the country’s economy following a vote in parliament.
In the USA, banks now own half the housing stock thanks to this fraud. It has been reported with Deutsche Bank alone owning more than a million „foreclosed“ homes.
But while even the USA Security Exchange Commission has forced Goldman Sachs to pay 550 million in compensation for ist role in this fractional reserve banking fraud, nothing has been done in Austria.
Ratings agencies are also being investigated in the USA fort their role in the fraud. Again no action has been taken in Europe.
Criminal charges brought by the financial regulator against HIB in Lower Austria were dropped and the files were „lost“ by the St Pölten state prosecutor this summer.
The few journalists reporting on these gigantic scandals are being gagged by the German and Austrian justice system.
When Nazi Armys went into other countrys, the Gestapo followed with lists of names and adresses of people they wanted to arrest. This could happen to those jouralists, once they are sentenced in absentia and european laws have been “harmonized” sufficiently…