David Teather in New York
Saturday August 6, 2005
The Guardian
The United States justice department has opened a criminal investigation into allegations that DaimlerChrysler-owned Mercedes paid bribes to foreign officials.
The investigation was sparked by a former Chrysler accountant, who has alleged in a lawsuit that the German carmaker kept secret bank accounts to bribe officials in Africa and Latin America.
The American financial watchdog, the securities and exchange commission, opened a similar inquiry last year.
The former managing director of the company's plant in Nigeria, Rudi Kornmayer, killed himself in a German park on July 22. Prosecutors in Stuttgart said he left a suicide note but have not released its contents. A spokesman for DaimlerChrysler said yesterday that the company is cooperating with the investigation.
A report in the Wall Street Journal suggested the inquiry is concentrated on a dozen countries. It said investigators were trying to establish whether senior company executives were aware the bribes were being paid.
Foreign bribes were outlawed in the US in 1977.
http://www.guardian.co.uk/business/story/0,3604,1543579,00.html
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