Austrian Green party lawmaker Peter Pilz has filed a complaint with Vienna prosecutors against Daimler, alleging deception and serious fraud linked to business deals that accompanied the country's 2003 purchase of Eurofighter jets. Vienna prosecutors are already conducting a fraud investigation into the Eurofighter consortium and Airbus, then called EADS, of which Daimler was the parent company when the $2 billion fighter jet order was agreed 14 years ago. Daimler on Saturday rejected the new charges. Airbus and the consortium, which includes Britain's BAE Systems and Italy's Leonardo, have also denied the accusations. Pilz, who has campaigned for years over the side deals, now wants prosecutors also to open a probe into Daimler.
"As a result of years of research, we filed legal charges against Daimler," said Pilz, confirming an earlier report by German weekly Der Spiegel. The complaint, seen by Reuters, was jointly filed with another Green lawmaker. A spokeswoman for the Vienna prosecutors on Saturday could neither confirm nor deny the complaint and said she would know more on Monday. Pilz said they had "a seamless chain of evidence" to prove that Daimler deceived the Austrian Economy Ministry about side deals intended to boost the local economy that were required by Austria to agree the purchase.
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