GENEVA: India does not respect human tights and individual freedoms and the country has been ticked off several times by Amnesty International and the American State Department. Therefore, documents in the Bofors case should not be transferred to Indian investigators.
This is the burden of the latest song ‘of some of the appellants in Geneva where a court is to decide on the transfer of secret bank papers detailing the illegal payments made by Bofors for the Indian gun contract.
In an interview with the local media, Vincent Jeanerette, a lawyer for one of the appellants said, “human rights are not respected in India.” Local papers have also reported that this underlines the position of most of the appellants who “fear” their rights as defendants will not be respected by the Indian Judicial system.
The appellants have also reportedly told the court India may use the information to trace fiscal fraud and that ‘the whole affair is “politically motivated since there was never any real investigation in India on this case. The appellants have also reportedly said India has not provided the necessary guarantees under the European convention on human rights.
It may be recalled that the Swiss federal court admitted the Indian request for assistance in July 1993, thus clearing the way, in principle, for the transfer of bank documents to New Delhi. The court however said certain guarantees had to be provided by Indian respecting international conventions. Such a guarantee was sent by India following which Geneva judge Paul Parading ruled that the bank documents could be sent to Indian investigators.
The appeals are against Perraudin’s last decision.
Bofors was contractually bound to pay, as commissions, between 10 and 12% of $1.3 billion for the gun contract with India.
Article extracted from this publication >> December 1, 1995
