Banks may have lost millions of zlotys in fuel scam

Police reports suggest that hundreds of millions of zlotys may have been lost by banks that loaned money to bogus firms involved in a massive fuel smuggling case. Some twenty domestic banks are thought to have loaned hundreds of millions of zlotys to companies set up by a gang that smuggled fuel into Poland and produced it illegally, before selling it without paying taxes. No exact figure can as yet be calculated for the banks' losses, but an initial police estimate puts the amount owing only to banks in Wroclaw at zl.150 million. As for the funds lost to the state treasury, the police think that in one year alone, 1998, the gang may have cheated nearly zl.300 million from tax revenues, and probably much more subsequently. In order to obtain the bank loans, the criminals forged papers showing that their companies were operating a huge business and had concluded contracts with some major partners, among them large foreign oil firms. (Gazeta Wyborcza, p.6) M.K.