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Kantas names top defense contractors as his "benefactors"

The course of his ill gotten gains was described in the deposition of former deputy procurements director at the defense ministry Antonis Kantas.

Kantas also described the people that paid him the bribes and those that set up his dummy offshore companies and bank accounts to launder the more than 13 million euros he received in kickbacks.

Of the major weapon system company representatives Kantas was bribed in person by Thomas Liakounakos (photo) for the purchase of Leopard II MBTs, Panos Efstathiou for the submarine combat suites made by STN ATLAS, the Type 214 subs, and the ASRAD close air defense systems, and Constantin Dafermos of SCORPION who represented Russian made systems.

He also mentioned Christos Houbavlis, representative of DASSAULT, whom he never met but whose company, through another member, paid him off for the MIRAGE 2000-5 fighter program.

Other programs Kantas was bribed for were the OSA AMK AA missile system through a representative of Russian firm ROSOVOORUZEHNIA, the Erieye AWACS program, The Arthur artillery radar system made by Ericsson, as well as the MRDB EXOCET surface to surface missile system.