PM ready to talk to UCI, threatens KNB with prosecutor

"I invited UCI president Alessandro Profumo to meet on Thursday in order to discuss the issue of the Italians' involvement in the Polish banking system," said Prime Minister Kazimierz Marcinkiewicz. He added that excluding Deputy Finance Minister Cezary Mech from the Banking Supervisory Commission (KNB) meeting which was to discuss the merger between the Pekao and BPH banks, had an adverse impact on the government's position in the dispute. "Nevertheless, we want to talk, we are ready for negotiations. We have a list of solutions favorable for Poland," declared Marcinkiewicz. The government wants to have a prosecutor present at today's meeting of the Commission. "We want to postpone the meeting by two weeks. Then we will manage to appeal against the decision [to exclude Mech] and we will restore the rights of the State Treasury Ministry as a party in the dispute," added Marcinkiewicz. The government may also file a motion to exclude the general inspector for banking supervision Wojciech Kwaśniak and NBP president Leszek Balcerowicz from the Commission due to the alleged conflict of interest. (Puls Biznesu, pp. 1, 5) E.B.