Former Bavarian premier Edmund Stoiber has used his influence to a greater extent than has been known so far to ensure the sale of the Hypo Group Alpe Adria bank to the Bavarian Bayern LB bank, exerting pressure on Croatia to that effect, the German television network ZDF said on Tuesday.
I sent out clear signals to the Croatian National Bank that failure of thesales agreement could spoil the good Bavarian-Croatian relations, ZDF quotedStoiber as saying in an interview with Croatian television in August 2007.
ZDF said in its Frontal 21 programme that Stoiber supported the sale becauseof the Bavarian bank's strategic interests in Southeast Europe.
The only obstacle to the sale and the takeover of a majority stake in theHypo Group Alpe Adria bank was the veto imposed by the Croatian central bank inMay 2007.
In a public statement made in late 2009, Croatian National Bank (HNB)governor Zeljko Rohatinski accused Stoiber of exerting pressure on the HNB atthe time.
Stoiber has disowned any political responsibility. Last week, at aclosed-door meeting of his CSU party, he expressed regret over the collapse ofHypo Group Alpe Adria and the financial damage suffered by Bayern LB, but againrejected any responsibility.
Stoiber recently told Der Spiegel weekly that he had not personallyadvocated the sale and that Hypo Group Alpe Adria was not a subject of histalks with Croatian Prime Minister Ivo Sanader in August 2007.
The new Bavarian premier and CSU president, Horst Seehofer, has called for aclarification of the scandal surrounding the financial collapse of Hypo GroupAlpe Adria, which has cost German taxpayers over 3.7 billion euros. TheBavarian parliament has announced that an inquiry commission will soon be setup for that purpose.
A few weeks ago, Bayern LB sold the Hypo bank back to Carinthia for thesymbolic price of 1 euro.
