PRAGUE, Jan. 19 (Xinhua) -- The Czech Chamber of Deputies stripped the immunity of Prime Minister and ANO chairman Andrej Babis and ANO deputy chairman Jaroslav Faltynek on Friday over suspected fraud related to an EU subsidy for Capi hnizdo farm.
The decision means the Czech police will be able to resume its criminal prosecution of the politicians.
In the plenary session, 111 of the 180 Members of Parliament (MPs) present voted in support of allowing the police to pursue Babis and Faltynek.
Both Babis and Faltynek supported their release to the police. They said they did not commit any crime, rather the case was fabricated by their political opponent.
Faltynek called his prosecution in the Capi hnizdo case absolutely unsubstantiated and complete nonsense. Babis claimed this was "an order by the mafia that was stealing billions here."
Babis said neither corruption nor a fraud accompanied the EU subsidy for the Capi hnizdo farm. He said the case would affect the formation of a new government.
The Czech Chamber of Deputies previously released Babis and Faltynek for prosecution in 2017 and the police accused them over the Capi hnizdo case. But both Babis and Faltynek defended their lower house seats in the general election in October 2017 and thus regained their immunity.
Faltynek has been accused of a subsidy fraud, while Babis stands accused of harming EU financial interests. Besides Babis and Faltynek, Czech police also prosecuted nine other people in the case, including Babis's wife Monika Babisova, his two adult children and his brother-in-law.
The Farma Capi hnizdo company belonged to Babis's Agrofert before late 2007 before its stake was transferred to bearer shares. The Central Bohemia Committee of the Regional Council of the Regional Operation Program approved an EU subsidy of 50 million crowns (about 2.4 million U.S. dollars) for the Capi hnizdo project in 2008.
The Capi hnizdo firm was considered a small business and if it were interconnected with a bigger business, it would not have been granted the subsidy. It observed this condition for a few years, but later it became part of Agrofert again. In February 2017, Babis transferred Agrofert to trust funds to comply with a new conflict of interest law. (1 U.S. dollar = 20.7 crowns)
Czech Prime Minister Andrej Babis on Wednesday announced at a press conference the resignation of his minority government, a day after it failed to gain the confidence of the Chamber of Deputies.
