Former Greek Siemens exec ordered held in Germany

A German court said Wednesday it has ordered that a former head of Siemens AG's Greek branch be kept in custody pending a decision on his possible extradition to face money laundering and bribery charges.

Michael Christoforakos, who holds both Greek and German citizenship, was arrested in Bavaria last week on a Greek-issued European warrant.

The head of Siemens' Greek branch from 1996 to 2007, Christoforakos is one of seven former Siemens executives targeted in an investigation by Greek prosecutors. They are probing a 1990s contract the company won with OTE, the dominant national telecom operator which was then state-owned.

One former OTE executive has also been charged. All deny wrongdoing.

According to the charges, former Siemens officials allegedly paid some euro57 million ($80 million) in kickbacks to secure the deal with OTE. Three of the suspects have been jailed in Greece pending trial.

Christoforakos' lawyers are fighting extradition, saying that he is innocent and arguing that the charges against him fall under the statute of limitations according to German law.

However, a Munich state court said in a release that it found that at least some of the alleged offenses have not fallen under the statute of limitations.

The court also found that Christoforakos was a possible flight risk, since he had gone into hiding in Germany before his arrest.

Judges did not immediately decide whether Christoforakos can be extradited and the court did not say when it might rule on that.