How Spain works : Ex-king to get away with corruption

Lundi 18 octobre 2021

How Spain works : Ex-king to get away with corruption

Dick Nichols Barcelona October 18, 2021

Web-based daily El Confidencial published a scoop on October 6 : After 16 months of investigation the Spanish prosecutor-general’s office will not be charging former king Juan Carlos with money-laundering, tax evasion and bribery.

The revelation that the ex-monarch will probably get off scot-free has shone a torch down the sewer of the Spanish State, highlighting the rats scurrying along its judicial, executive, and parliamentary reaches.

How could the case against Juan Carlos, dubbed an “international commission agent” in the prosecutor-general’s own documents, be shelved when his operations have become notoriously public ?

The prosecutors, on information from their Swiss counterpart Yves Bertossa, have had solid evidence that the ex-king practised money-laundering, bribery, influence-peddling, and tax fraud.

For years he hid more than €100 million in tax havens, never declaring this fortune to the tax office.

Most of the hoard (€65 million) was a “gift” from defunct Saudi king Abdalá bin Abdulaziz al-Saúd, in truth a reward for helping a consortium of Spanish firms win the contract to build the High-Speed Train line between Medina and Mecca.

The Spanish capitalists beat their French rivals to this prize when they reduced their quote by 30%.

Bertossa continues to investigate the money managers who handled the €65 million transfer into the ex-king’s secret Swiss bank account.

Juan Carlos also used “black” credit cards, secretly financed by Mexican millionaire Allen de Jesús Sanginés Krause. This undeclared fund was mainly used to cover €8 million in private jet travel and the €3 million in similar travel by Corinna Larsen, the ex-king’s former, now estranged, lover.

This scam was executed via an arm’s-length “foundation” in tax shelter Liechtenstein. Lire la suite.

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