BERLIN — Germany and Switzerland were heading for a fresh spat over banking secrecy Tuesday after Berlin decided to buy a disc said to hold details of some 1,500 suspected tax-dodgers with funds in Swiss accounts.
German Finance Minister Wolfgang Schaeuble gave a green light “in principle” to stumping up a reported 2.5 million euros (3.5 million dollars) to an anonymous informer for data that could net the taxman around 100 million euros.
In a pre-released interview with the Augsburger Allgemeine regional daily, Schaeuble said: “There was no other decision we could have taken” after a 2008 precedent whereby Germany paid for tax data from Liechtenstein.
But the affair has damaged German-Swiss relations and prompted a bout of soul-searching as politicians agonised over whether it was morally right to buy what seem to be stolen goods and whether the data would be legally admissible.
Chancellor Angela Merkel said that “everything must be done to get hold of these data” but senior members of her own Christian Democratic Union (CDU) party cast doubt on whether the disc would stand up as evidence in a courtroom.
The head of the parliamentary legal affairs committee, Siegfried Kauder, told the Neue Osnabruecker Zeitung daily that he believed “the data would not be valid in a criminal case against the tax-evaders concerned.” Analysts too said judges could throw out information obtained in this manner.
Tobias Singelnstein, a professor of law at Berlin’s Free University, told AFP: “It is a bit absurd to prosecute a breach of the law by ourselves breaking the law.” But Schaeuble said he felt on firm legal ground as no court had yet questioned the validity of the Liechtenstein data.
However, the Financial Times Deutschland reported that Germany’s constitutional court was already examining whether these data — which resulted in the taxman clawing back some 180 million euros — were admissible.
Meanwhile, ethical questions have also been raised, with Defence Minister Karl-Theodor zu Guttenberg, a close Merkel ally, saying he would have a problem with using data that was obtained by legally questionable methods. The affair, which made the front page of most German papers on Tuesday, has split the public and the press, as well as the politicians.
A poll by Stern magazine released on Tuesday showed a narrow majority of Germans — 57 percent — in favour of buying the names, with 43 percent opposed. The Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung daily described the disc as “forbidden fruit” and said the government “should not deal with data thieves.”
On the other side of the fence was mass circulation daily Bild, which wrote in an editorial: “It is right and sensible that the chancellor spoke out so quickly in favour of buying the information.” “The federal government’s message is crystal-clear: if you evade tax, your number is up.”
What is also crystal clear is that Berlin is facing an increasingly vitriolic diplomatic showdown with its Alpine neighbour, which views the saga as another attack on its cherished banking secrecy.
Maximilian Reimann, president of the Swiss parliamentary committee on relations with Germany, accused Berlin of “handling stolen goods” in an interview with Swiss radio. And a spokesman for the Swiss Banking Federation, Thomas Sutter, called into question the ratification of a tax treaty between the two countries.
“The German side cannot support a criminal act and then enter into negotiations with Switzerland,” Sutter told the Frankfurter Rundschau.
