Latvijas Tilti CEO detained in Lithuania on suspicions of bribery

Genadijs Kamkalovs, CEO of Latvia's largest road and bridge construction company Latvijas Tilti, was detained in Lithuania on Thursday on suspicions of having paid a bribe to the head of the Lithuanian Klaipeda port's director for infrastructure, Gediminas Zumaras, for decisions that would bring financial benefit to the company.

Six more Latvijas Tilti employees have been detained in Latvia in connection with the bribery case.

"G.K., as a representative of the Latvian company that has won a few construction contracting tenders at the directorate of the Klaipeda state seaport estimated at more than 10 million euros has paid a bribe of more than more than 250 minimum standards of living (9,500 euros) to G.Z. in a few counts," the Lithuanian Special Investigation Service (STT) said.

The STT investigation is conducted in co-operation with the Latvian Corruption Prevention Bureau (KNAB). Kamkalovs and Zumaras were detained as part of the probe on Thursday, and STT agents also searched the Klaipeda port's directorate.

A simultaneous operation and other procedural actions took place in Latvia. KNAB detained six individuals holding high posts in one of Latvia's biggest concerns and conducted about 20 searches, seizing documents that are significant for the probe and more than 100,000 euros in cash, STT said. No names or corporate names have been disclosed.

Lithuania's Prime Minister Algirdas Butkevicius, currently on a visit in Klaipeda, told journalists on Friday that the STT also raided the office of Klaipeda port CEO Arvydas Vaitkus on Thursday. In Butkevicius' words, employees of the company will be called to account if the suspicions prove correct. He said he did not know any further details yet.

Latvijas Tilti has won a number of contracts at the Lithuanian port of Klaipeda — together with Borta construction company of the Lithuanian Kaminera group recently won a 11.7-million-euro tender to deepen the Malku Bay, while the consortium of BMGS and Lithuania's Hidrostatyba should reconstruct the embankments of Bega stevedoring company for 14.952 million euros. Furthermore, Latvijas Tilti built the embankment of the passenger terminal at the Klaipeda port in 2013 for 32.36 million euros.

KNAB chief Jaroslavs Strelcenoks told journalists Friday that the Latvian anti-corruption bureau was conducting two criminal probes in collaboration with the Lithuanian Special Investigation Service. One of them has been launched in Lithuania against a Lithuanian state official and a Latvian entrepreneur. The Latvian entrepreneur reportedly gave a bribe to the infrastructure director of Klaipeda port in return for construction orders.

Another criminal investigation has been started in Latvia. “On Thursday, computers, telephones, and several hundreds of thousands of euros were seized and six persons detained in the course of procedural activities, including more than 20 searches,” Strelcenoks said, adding that the total amount of cash seized during the searches was 300,000 euros. The probe has been started in connection with a construction tender organised by the Riga City Council’s Traffic Department and it involves one of Latvia’s leading construction firms. Strelcenoks did not specify if the company in question was Latvijas Tilti.

The Latvian anti-corruption chief also confirmed that the two probes are interconnected. The persons involved in the cases are implicated in a number of criminal offenses, including abuse of office powers, forgery, bribery, and graft.