(Bloomberg) -- Peter Kazimir, a member of the European Central Bank’s Governing Council, was charged with bribery in Slovakia.

Kazimir, who heads the country’s central bank, rejected the allegations. His lawyer Ondrej Mularcik said that Kazimir received notification of the charges late Monday and will file a complaint against them. Local media earlier reported that the charges were filed.  

“I don’t feel guilty of any crime,“ Kazimir said in a statement distributed by the central bank in Slovakia’s capital, Bratislava, adding that the claims against him are unsubstantiated.

The graft accusations are related to his previous role as finance minister in the government of Prime Minister Robert Fico, which lost power in 2020, the newspaper Sme reported. Kazimir has been in his current job since 2019. He’s been defying political pressure to step down as a police investigation unfolded.

Kazimir is the second central bank governor from an east European euro-area country to face bribery allegations.

Read more: ECB Chiefs Enjoy Wide Diplomatic Immunity, EU Court Adviser Says

In 2018, Latvian prosecutors charged Ilmars Rimsevics, a former member of the European Central Bank’s Governing Council, was detained and later charged with soliciting bribes from a commercial lender.

Rimsevics is fighting criminal charges that he solicited 500,000 euros ($576,350) in bribes and a trip to Russia in exchange for helping the now-defunct Trasta Komercbanka with regulatory issues. His arrest in 2018 was one of a string of scandals that threatened the reputation of the financial industry in the euro-area nation. He denies all charges and blames a group of commercial banks for his legal problems. 

ECB Governing Council members enjoy wide immunity from prosecution in their formal duties, an adviser to the European Union’s top court said in April in relation to Rimsevics’s case.

The immunity enjoyed by the officials prevents that “judicial proceedings are initiated or measures of national constraints are adopted” before there’s “an agreement with the institution to which this person belongs,” Advocate General Juliane Kokott said in a non-binding opinion then.

Kazimir is the highest-ranking member of the previous Slovak cabinet to be caught up in an anti-corruption push by the government, which took power last year after a campaign centered on fighting graft. 

Former premier Fico’s record-long rule ended in a wave of public anger after the gunning down of an investigative journalist who wrote about links between crime and politics. Anti-government demonstrations eventually toppled Fico. After the new government rose to power, a string of officials were arrested including a former deputy justice minister, a special prosecutor and a police chief - though authorities had not charged any top politicians until now.

 

 

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