Ministry of defense of Austria suspected of Airbus in the manipulation of prices.
Austria Thursday, February 16, filed at the court in Vienna a lawsuit against Airbus Defence and Space GmbH and Eurofighter Jagdflugzeug GmbH in connection with the purchase of fighter Eurofighter. According to the Minister of defense Hans Peter was Doskocil, by the end of 2016 Austria had caused damage of 1.1 billion euros.
A lawsuit has 130 pages and prepared by results of work of the special Commission, established in 2012. As stated by Hans Peter was Doskocil, the two companies since 2002, even before the conclusion of the transaction knowingly provided false information about the equipment and timing of delivery of aircraft. In addition, maintenance of the fighters was much more than expected at closing. If the Austrian authorities knew about it, they would have made a choice in favour of another supplier - the Swedish company Saab, said was Doskocil.
In 2003, Austria signed a contract for the supply of 18 aircraft Eurofighter total amount of about 2 billion euros. After the change of government in Vienna tried to cancel the contract. As a result, in 2007, Austria was able to negotiate with Airbus to reduce the number of ordered aircraft to 15 and discount of 250 million euros.
In addition, a few years ago there were reports about possible cases of corruption around the transaction. In Vienna Prosecutor’s office is investigating on suspicion of abuse of office and money laundering.
Earlier it was reported that Airbus will sharply reduce the production of the largest aircraft.
