ATHENS, July 16 (Xinhua) -- Greece's parliament voted on early Tuesday for the indictment of former Finance Minister George Papaconstantinou on criminal charges over his handling of the so-called Lagarde list of big depositors in Switzerland.
By 220 votes in favor out of 283 deputies present at the proceedings the assembly ratified the recommendation of a special parliamentary committee that Papaconstantinou stands trial for breach of duty.
By 206 votes the body gave the "green light" for his prosecution for breach of faith and by 166 votes for doctoring a public document.
The socialist former minister who served in the post from October 2009 - shortly before the start of the Greek debt crisis - to June 2011 is accused of tampering with the list of some 2,000 Greeks with major deposits in an HSBC bank branch in Geneva.
The names of four of his relatives were erased from the list which has handed to him by International Monetary Fund Managing Director Christine Lagarde in 2010 when she was Finance Minister of France so that Greece could investigate possible tax evasion.
Addressing the parliament shortly before the vote, Papaconstantinou denied any wrongdoing. He claimed that his is the victim of a political motivated campaign because he was serving as Finance Minister when Greece resorted to the European Union/International Monetary Fund rescue mechanism to escape default, signing painful bailout deals.
"I am being targeted as a scapegoat for this reason, because I was Finance Minister at the time," he said.
Following the parliament's decision, under Greece's legislation, a special judicial council is to be formed to hear the case.
Papaconstantinou faces a maximum ten year sentence, if found guilty.
He is not the only former official facing public anger though over the chronic failure to investigate possible tax dodging and bear fruits.
Earlier on Monday a prosecutor suggested that charges of misdemeanor be filed against former heads of Greece's financial crimes squad (SDOE) Yannis Diotis and Yannis Kapeleris for the same case.
Wide-spread tax cheating is considered as a key cause of the debt crisis which brought Greece at the brink of collapse leading to a tough austerity and reform program which has fuelled recession and the suffering of the average Greek citizen.
According to estimates tax evasion costs Greece about 20 percent of its annual GDP.
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