Publisher faces prison over Swiss bank names

A Greek publisher has appeared in court following publication in his magazine of a list of the names of more than 2,000 Greek residents with Swiss bank accounts, a case that has caused political controversy in the crisis-hit country.

Costas Vaxevanis was in court on a misdemeanour charge of violating data protection laws, after the weekend publication in Hot Doc magazine of a list of alleged depositors at an HSBC bank in Switzerland.

The trial was postponed until Thursday. Vaxevanis could face up to two years in prison if convicted.

The published names were allegedly taken from data on 24,000 HSBC customers that the bank reported stolen in 2010. The Greece-related names were passed to the Greek government by French authorities. Former officials were recently questioned in parliament for allegedly failing to investigate the Greek list for potential tax fraud.

A major Greek newspaper reprinted the names of the more than 2,000 wealthy Greeks with Swiss bank accounts.

Ta Nea devoted 10 pages to the list of accounts said to hold about €2bn until 2007, a sum that riveted austerity-hit Greeks, angry at the privileges of politicians and an elite seen as having enriched themselves at the country’s expense.

The list, given to Greece by French authorities in 2010, contains the names of 2,059 Greek account holders at HSBC in Switzerland to be probed for possible tax evasion.

It has been dubbed the “Lagarde List” after Christine Lagarde, the head of the IMF who was the French finance minister when the list was handed over.

The centre-left daily said that despite publishing the same list as Hot Doc it was not leaping to conclusions about “its content nor the connotations it evokes in a large part of the public”. It did not say why it had decided to reprint the list and stressed there was no evidence linking anyone on the list to tax evasion.

“Ta Nea is publishing the list today. Will they be prosecuted? A month ago it published a list of the tax returns of celebrities. Charges weren’t filed,” Vaxevanis wrote on Twitter.

“Today, it’s not Hot Doc that’s on trial but press freedom in Greece, and truth,” Vaxevanis said.

The magazine says the list, which includes well-known political and business figures, was sent to it anonymously and authorities have not confirmed if the list was authentic.

Greek authorities have said there is no evidence that people included in the list have violated the law, but former ministers have come under fire in Greek media for not investigating the list for suspected evaders.

“He published a list of names without special permission and violated the law on personal data,” a police official said following the arrest of Vaxevanis.