For SPD Chancellor candidate Olaf Scholz (SPD) it is not good news a good two weeks before the federal election: the Osnabrück public prosecutor visited the Federal Ministry of Finance on Thursday.

The fact that the investigation was not aimed at Scholz and that the Federal Ministry of Justice received visits from officials from Osnabrück at the same time can easily get lost in the fast-moving world of news.

The raid began at a quarter past nine, four officers from the Osnabrück police and six members of the public prosecutor's office were on duty, Spiegel reported at noon.

Manfred Schäfers

Business correspondent in Berlin.

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Finance Minister Scholz reacted disgruntled. The public prosecutor's office had questions to the finance and justice ministries. “That could have been put in writing,” he said in Potsdam. Everyone can evaluate that for themselves.

The Federal Ministry of Finance had previously confirmed the raid. "It's about a process that has been running for more than a year," it said when asked. It is directed against unknown employees of the Central Office for Transaction Investigations. The authority, which often goes by the abbreviation FIU (Financial Intelligence Unit), is based in Cologne. "The aim of the action taken by the public prosecutor in several federal ministries is, as evidenced by the decision of the Osnabrück District Court of August 10, 2021, an expanded clarification of the facts," emphasized the spokesman. The clarification of the facts concerns the responsible specialist department in the central office. "Of course, the Federal Ministry of Finance fully supports the authorities," he emphasized and made it clearer:"The underlying suspicion is expressly not directed against employees of the Federal Ministry of Finance."

Criticism from the FDP

The public prosecutor's office is primarily concerned with the identification of employees of the central office in Cologne and information on the extent to which the so-called risk-based approach of the central office has been legally discussed and secured.

With their help, the central office subjects every incoming report to an initial assessment.

Reports that correspond to at least one of the - currently ten - risk focuses would be checked in more detail "manually".

“The fact that the public prosecutor's office searches the Federal Ministry of Finance and Justice is probably a unique process.

If the allegations of thwarting punishment in the office against those responsible for the Financial Intelligence Unit are confirmed, it is a real scandal, "said the financial policy spokesman for the FDP parliamentary group, Florian Toncar:" It is already clear: the Financial Intelligence Unit is under Olaf after years Scholz is in bad shape because he treated her like a stepchild. ”The search shows that“ Olaf Scholz has no control over his business area ”.

Money laundering paradise in Germany?

The Federal Ministry of Finance, in turn, recalls that under the aegis of Wolfgang Schäuble (CDU), the FIU has been relocated from the BKA to customs. This has led to discussions in the specialist public. As finance minister, Scholz ensured that the central office was strengthened through additional staff, expanded competencies and technical improvements. The head of the FIU was also replaced in 2018. In addition, the workforce has been expanded considerably, from an initial 165 employees to currently 469 employees, in order to cope with the continuously increasing number of registrations. 

For years there has been repeated criticism that Germany is a money laundering paradise.

The extent is estimated at 100 billion euros.

In February, the reporting requirements were tightened again: Suspected cases no longer relate only to serious crimes such as organized crime or terrorism, but also to petty crime.

For fear of fines, banks in which thousands of employees deal with money laundering now also reported trivialities from the central office, observers report.

In ten years the reports are said to have increased twelve-fold to more than 100,000, of which only a fraction is criminally relevant.

Most recently there was talk of a good 300 cases.

As the "Spiegel" announced, the starting point of the current investigation by the Osnabrück public prosecutor's office is a suspicious transaction report from a bank in June 2018. It was about a transfer to Africa for more than 1 million euros. According to the information, the bank suspected that it was about terrorist financing as well as arms and drug trafficking. "The FIU took note of this report, but did not forward it to German law enforcement authorities," he quotes the agency's spokesman. Therefore, it was not possible to stop the payment.