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India in Italy court battle over helicopter deal

The Indian defence ministry on Tuesday said it will appeal against an Italian court order rejecting its request to recover some €278 million in bank guarantees over a scrapped helicopter deal.

Published: 18 March 2014 09:35 CET

India in Italy court battle over helicopter deal

Italian prosecutors suspect bribes of around €50 million were paid to Indian officials as part of the deal. Helicopter photo: Stephen Meese/Shutterstock.com

India had cancelled the deal with the Italian-owned AgustaWestland in January to buy 12 luxury helicopters amid allegations that the company paid bribes to win the €556 million contract.

On Monday, a court in Milan ruled in favour of AgustaWestland, preventing India from encashing guarantees of more than €278 million, a statement from Agustawestland's parent company Finmeccanica said.

The Indian defence ministry responded by stating that it "will be filing an appeal against the order".

"Simultaneously, the government will vigorously pursue all options for encashment of the bank guarantees," a statement from the Indian defence ministry said.

India had suspended the contract in 2013 after Italian investigators began looking into accusations that AgustaWestland paid bribes to win the contract in 2010.

Italian prosecutors suspect kickbacks worth around 10 percent of the deal – €50 million – were paid to Indian officials to swing the deal in favour of AgustaWestland, according to Italian media reports. The company denies any wrongdoing.

India's defence ministry came under scrutiny after detectives raided the home of former air force chief S.P. Tyagi as part of the probe into the allegations of bribery.

The controversy was further embarrassment for the Congress-led government which has been buffeted by a string of corruption scandals in the lead up to a general elections starting next month.

The aborted deal has also come as a severe setback to Finmeccanica, whose chief executive Giuseppe Orsi resigned after being arrested last February.

Orsi denies any wrongdoing and his lawyer has called the allegations against him "inconsistent" and his arrest "unjustified". The deal is currently under arbitration in India.

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Travel: Spain imposes mandatory quarantine on arrivals from India over virus strain fears

Photo: JACK GUEZ/AFP

Spanish government spokesperson María Jesús Montero made the announcement on Tuesday, explaining that as there are no direct flights between Spain and India, it isn’t possible for Spain to adopt measures such as banning arrivals outright as other European countries have done.

The quarantine requirement for travellers arriving to Spain from India starts on May 1st 2021.

India joins a number of South American and African nations that are already on Spain’s quarantine list to stem the spread of the Brazilian and South African variants.

According to the Spanish government’s website, those “coming from the Federative Republic of Brazil, the Republic of South Africa, Republic of Botswana, Union of Comoros, Republic of Ghana, Republic of Kenya, Republic of Mozambique, United Republic of Tanzania, Republic of Zambia, Republic of Zimbabwe, Republic of Peru and Republic of Colombia, must remain in quarantine for 10 days after their arrival in Spain, or for the duration of their stay if it is shorter than that. This period may end earlier, if on the seventh day the person is tested for acute infection with negative results.”

India is currently battling a record-breaking rise in Covid-19 infections that has overwhelmed hospitals and led to severe bed and oxygen shortages.

A key question is whether a new variant with potentially worrying mutations – B.1.617 – is behind what is currently the world’s fastest-growing outbreak, setting four records in a row for the highest daily coronavirus infections by one country, the latest on Sunday with 349,691 new cases.

The country has also been recording around 3,000 deaths per day from Covid-19.

Germany, France, the United Kingdom, Switzerland, the Czech Republic, Italy and the Netherlands have all imposed restrictions or travel bans on arrivals from India in recent days.

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“No cases of the Indian variant have been detected to date to my knowledge,” Spain’s Emergencies Coordinator Chief Fernando Simón told journalists on Monday.

“The intel does not indicate that we have to worry about it,” he added, given that the UK variant now makes up 94 percent of all infections in Spain.

“We cannot rule out that a case (of the Indian variant) may be detected”, Simón admitted, but “so far it is not a variant of concern, it is a variant of interest”.

Patients breath with the help of oxygen masks inside a banquet hall temporarily converted into a Covid-19 coronavirus ward in New Delhi on April 27th, 2021. (Photo by Money SHARMA / AFP)

That is not a view shared by Amós José García Rojas , president of the Spanish Association of Vaccinations (AEV), who argues “we have to worry a lot” about the “chaos” that this new variant is leaving in the Asian country and why it could affect the spread of this strain of the virus.

“This new variant is fundamentally worrying because of what it is causing in India,” Rojas told medical publication Redacción Médica.

“It shows that as there are territories where people are largely not vaccinated, there’s many people who are susceptible to the virus and it creates a breeding ground for the development of new variants”.

“We cannot vaccinate comprehensively in some countries and forget about other countries at the mercy of God.

“We have to worry about everyone because there is a risk that situations like the one seen in India will happen again.

So far, the B.1.617 variant has been categorised by the World Health Organisation as a “variant of interest”.

Other variants detected in Brazil, South Africa and the UK have been categorised as “of concern”, because they are more transmissible, virulent or might reduce antibody efficacy.

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