Last update - 00:00 23/11/2007
Police delay recommendation on indicting PM until after summit
By Jonathan Lis, Haaretz Correspondent
The Israel Police decided Friday to delay its recommendation on whether to indict Prime Minister Ehud Olmert for suspected impropriety in the sale of Bank Leumi, until after next week's U.S.-sponsored Middle East peace conference in Annapolis, Maryland.
Olmert, who was serving as finance minister at the time of the sale, is suspected of interfering in the privatization of the bank to benefit a friend, Australian tycoon Frank Lowy. The prime minister was questioned under caution in the affair last month.
The police, which had originally planned to issue the recommendation on Sunday - just two days before the summit - were under considerable political pressure to delay the recommendation until after the prime minister's return from the U.S.
The police had been approached on the matter by numerous MKs and public figures. Major General Yohanan Danino, the head of police investigations and intelligence, decided Friday on the delay following consultations on the matter.
Once Danino and the team of detectives from the National Fraud Investigation Unit reach a decision on whether there is enough evidence to indict the prime minister, the case file and the evidence included in it will be handed over to the prosecution.
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