Efstathiou fingers military officers

The deposition of 82 year old weapon system representative Panos Efstathiou and ASRAD began early Thursday morning, on charges bribing Antonis Kantas “for the purchase of Type 214 submarines, while representing German firm STN ATLAS.

According to his attorney, Michalis Dimitrakopoulos, his client is resolved to say all he knows and has already named ten armed forces officers that are implicated in the specific purchases he is being charged for. Efstathiou has also consented to the opening up of his bank accounts.

After Mr Efstathiou's statement that he would cooperate, judicial authorities did not issue an arrest warrant, but just a summons for deposition. He has admitted to having handed out a total of 3 million euros in bribes.

Among those Mr Efstathiou named were those of deceased former Navy chief Georgios Theodoroulakis, and former Army chief Kostantinos Panayotakis.

Admiral Georgios Theodoroulakis was born in Rethymno, Crete in 1945 and graduated from the Hellenic Naval Academy in 1967. He served as commander of submarines, deputy chief of naval staff, chief of the fleet, becoming Chief of Naval General Staff in February 2001. He resigned his commission in March 2002 after refusing to discharge a vice admiral that was his co-cadet at the academy and also from Rethymno, while also denouncing then minister Yannos Papantoniou for meddling in his responsibilities. He was related to the Vardinoyannis family. He died in February 2008 of cancer.

Lieutenant general Konstantinos Panayotakis served as chief of the Hellenic Army General Staff (1999-2001) overseeing the transformation of the force structure of the army during that period. His retirement was at some point linked to rumors of DU ammunition in the Greek arsenal. He graduated with honors from military schools in Greece and abroad, and was generally considered a very competent officer. The present chief of the army Michael Kostarakos was his adjutant during his time as army head.

He also named three German high ranking officials of ATLAS that were responsible for the kickbacks. Mr Efstathiou also seems to have stated that a certain head of state arms industry EBO had received money to give to Pavlos Nikolaidis also an EBO official to whose child jailed former defense minister was godfather.

When asked by inquisitors about the 18 million euros he received in his accounts, Panos Efstathiou retorted that the opening of his accounts will show what he has received and what he's paid out.

However, so far his deposition has focused on what Antonis Kantas has already revealed causing the frustration of inquisitor Gavriil Mallis who asked him to name all names of those bribed. So far, it seems Mr Efstathiou has denied bribing former defense minister Yannos Papantoniou and his predecessor Akis Tsohatzopoulos, as well as defnse ministry secretary general Yannis Sbokos.

He also denounced Antonis Kantas as an extortionist noting that it was he that asked for money not to block the procurement process.

Panos Efstathiou also seems to have stated that payments were made through his own offshore company IRON, claiming that he also owned two more offshore firms.

Panos Efstathiou was named by Antonis Kantas as the man who gave him a bribe of 600,000 euros in order to expedite the signing if the procurement of the type 214 submarines.

Kantas' revelations did not stop here as he also maintained that Panos Efstathiou also gave him a bribe for SNT ATLAS's anti aircraft missile system: “apart from the submarines, Efstathiou approached me and promised me a kickback worth 1% of the cost of the program that had to do with command and control system of theSTINGER ASRAD missile system, also produced by SNT ATLAS. The total cost of the project was 60 – 70,000,000 euros. I personalty received about 1.5 million euros. As with the submarines, I have no proof that Efstathiou paid kickbacks to others, but, I have the feeling that he had access to the Hellenic Army General Staff.”

On Friday, another arms representative, Dimitris Papachristos is slated to give a deposition. Through his attorney, Mr Papachristos has pleaded amnesia that might impede his deposition.