/ 18 June 2008

German industrial giant cleared in arms-deal probe

German prosecutors have found no evidence linking the country’s industrial giant ThyssenKrupp to corruption in South Africa’s arms deal, the company said on Wednesday.

”Criminally relevant behaviour, in particular acts of bribery, was not established by the public prosecutor’s office,” said a spokesperson for ThyssenKrupp Marine Systems in South Africa.

Having established that there was no case against anyone under investigation, the public prosecutor’s office in Düsseldorf closed the investigation without sanction or cash settlement.

The Germans informed the South African and Angolan authorities of the outcome and withdrew all requests for legal support made previously.

The German investigation was started in 2006 to establish whether employees of the ThyssenKrupp Group, among others, were guilty of criminal behaviour in connection with the sale of four ships to the South African Navy in the late 1990s, and an intended sale of ships to the Angolan Navy.

At the same time, in different investigative proceedings not substantively connected with the above-mentioned matter, penal orders were issued against two former employees of the ThyssenKrupp Group, accused of fraud and or abetting fraud.

The German request for help in investigating bribery in the arms deal — a political hot potato — reached South Africa in October last year, the Mail & Guardian reported at the time.

The request had been on the cards since June the previous year, when investigators in Germany raided premises associated with the consortium that was contracted in 1999 to sell South Africa the four warships worth billions.

The investigators reportedly found evidence that ThyssenKrupp, which leads the German Frigate Consortium, had paid $25-million (about R175-million) in kickbacks.

National Prosecuting Authority spokesperson Tlali Tlali on Wednesday said he had heard about the decision in Germany but was not in a position to comment.