In a telephone interview on the radio show of journalist Lazaros Mavros, which was heard today in court, Christodoulos Christodoulou stated that he did not know Michalis Zolotas even about the investigations of the prosecuting authorities for the transfer of € 1 million to the company A. C. Christodoulou Consultants.
Testifying as a prosecution witness in the "Focus" case before the Permanent Criminal Court of Nicosia, journalist Lazaros Mavros stated that on the morning of June 21, 2013 he called Mr. Christodoulou and invited him to comment on the front page article of the newspaper "Polis" One million euros for Christodoulou ".
In his interview, Mr. Christodoulou is heard to state, among other things, that he has no knowledge of the content of the article and that he has no idea about the investigations of the prosecuting authorities in the case, while talking about an attempt to incriminate him by the newspaper.
The former Governor of the Central Bank is also heard to state that this is not the first time that this newspaper publishes "unfounded" articles about him and that he had filed lawsuits against the newspaper for libel.
Asked about the transfer of € 1 million to the company A. C. Christodoulou Consultants, Mr. Christodoulou replied that he could not give "details" for this amount because the company, from its inception until 2010 , as he claimed, belonged to his daughter and that he did not have any relationship with the company during that period.
As he is heard to state, he took over the company after 2010 when he resigned from the position of Governor of the Central Bank. "Once the investigation has begun, this could be clarified. Ικά Personally, I am not worried that there is anything wrong with my daughter's company, in which, I repeat, I was not a shareholder," he said in an interview.
When asked by the journalist if he knows Andreas Vgenopoulos and Michalis Zolotas, Mr. Christodoulou is heard to state that "I do not know Mr. Zolotas".
During his cross-examination by Mr. Christodoulou's lawyer, Efstathios Efstathiou, and when asked about it, Mr. Mavros said that he had woken up Mr. Christodoulou to invite him to comment on the article in the newspaper "Politis".
Regarding the statement of Mr. Christodoulou that he did not know Mr. Zolotas, Mr. Efstathiou submitted to the witness that his client was seized with hexapine "and it is something that can happen to any person when hexapine is taken to answer not with a cold mind" , with Mr. Mavros answering that "I can not comment on this".
"This happened, he told a lie," Mr. Efstathiou later said.
The digital record on which Mr. Christodoulou's interview was stored was submitted to the court as a presumption. The digital record was handed over to the investigating authorities by Sigma's sound engineer George Karabatakis, whose testimony was submitted as an admissible fact in court regarding the truth of its content.
Subsequently, RIK journalist Elita Michailidou testified as a prosecution witness regarding the interview she received from Andreas Vgenopoulos on 16/5/2014, in his office in Athens, in the presence of his own TV crew.
According to what she mentioned in her testimony, Mrs. Michailidou, the interview would be given to her later by Mr. Vgenopoulos to be broadcast by RIK, whose management, however, refused to broadcast it. As she mentioned, the interview was made public by Andreas Vgenopoulos. The transcript of the two-hour interview was submitted to the court as evidence.
During today's trial, the written testimony given to the Police by the Journalist of KYPE Thomas Kettenis was also submitted as a presumption in court. Mr. Kettenis's testimony concerned the transmission by KYPE of written statements by Mr. Christodoulos and Andreas Vgenopoulos that had been sent to the agency.
The deposition of the Secretary of the Board of Directors of the Central Bank of Cyprus Avgi Mylonas in relation to the minutes of the Board meetings was completed today.
The trial continues on March 19 and 20 with the presentation of new prosecution witnesses.
The accused in the case, apart from Mr. Christodoulou, are Michalis Zolotas, the daughter of Mr. Christodoulou, Athena Christodoulou, the ex-husband of Andreas Kizouridis and Michalis Fole as well as the companies A. C. Christodoulou Consultants Ltd, Marfin Invesment Group - MIG (formerly Marfin Financial Group - MFG) and Focus MaritimeCorp. as legal entities.
The indictment of the case includes a total of 24 charges, in relation to offenses of corruption, embezzlement, bribery, extortion, abuse of power, abuse of trust and money laundering.
The presumption of innocence applies to all defendants until their guilt is proven by the court beyond any reasonable doubt.
Source: KYPE
