Swiss Irate at Money-Launder Charges

ZURICH —  The scourge of the Swiss Establishment is at it again and a lot of people don’t like it.

Dubbed “Sociology’s Rambo” by the media, 54-year-old Jean Ziegler has devoted much of his life to being his country’s fiercest critic.

His latest book, “Switzerland Washes Whiter,” is a colorful and scathing attack on money laundering, which he claims supports Swiss society.

“Switzerland is our planet’s principal junction for money laundering, the recycling of the profits of death,” Ziegler says on the first page.

Already a best-seller at home and due to appear soon in 14 languages abroad, the book has prompted six lawsuits and a rash of death threats.

It is not the first time Ziegler has rankled the Swiss Establishment. In 1975 he published “La Suisse au Dessus de Tout Soupcon” (Switzerland Above All Suspicion) condemning exploitation of the Third World by the rich.

In taking up the money-laundering theme he seems to have touched an even rawer nerve.

A small, untidy man with deep-set, twinkling eyes and seemingly limitless verbal energy, Ziegler bears no physical resemblance to the gun-toting film hero Rambo but his words have almost the explosiveness of an automatic weapon.

Most of his countrymen accuse him of wild exaggeration. He retorts that Switzerland needs a strong dose of self-evaluation.

“For generations (Switzerland) was a symbol of hygiene, health and cleanliness. Today it is a source of infection. I don’t know of any other social group more ignorant of itself, more stiff, more secret,” he says.

Many Swiss are infuriated by Ziegler’s aggressive criticism. In an editorial, the tabloid Blick called him a “bird which fouls its own nest.”

The daily Tages Anzeiger said more sympathetically: “The upstanding Swiss cannot take this mixture of wicked political cabaret, radical critique of bourgeois capitalism and verbal guerrilla warfare.”

Ziegler could not be happier about the criticism. He told a recent news conference: “Switzerland has no culture of conflict. The book is intended to spark debate.”

The Swiss Bankers’ Assn. said the book contains many assertions but no proof. “Swiss banking secrecy is by no means absolute. It does not protect criminals,” it said in a statement.

A number of people are angry enough with Ziegler to go to court.

One of them is Hans Kopp, husband of former Justice Minister Elisabeth Kopp, who stepped down after admitting she told her husband about a money-laundering investigation into a company of which he was vice chairman.

Ziegler devoted a whole chapter to the couple.

He seems less worried about legal battles than death threats. He and his family live under police guard.

“The threats are very precise,” he said. “They always say something like ‘Yesterday your son was here, you were there.’ It’s a kind of psychological destabilization.”

Ziegler studied in New York, Geneva and Paris, where he became a friend of philosopher Jean-Paul Sartre and, so the story goes, changed his name from Hans to the Francophone Jean.

“I also spent some time working in the sugar fields of Cuba,” he said. “That was my romantic phase.”

Switzerland passed a bill in March outlawing money laundering. Anyone who knowingly conceals the origins of illegal profits now faces a fine or imprisonment. However, the law will not penalize negligence in accepting criminal funds.

Ziegler says in his book: “The banker or his employee must have direct knowledge of drug trafficking and show commitment to helping it. I don’t think there exists in the world a banker stupid enough to make such intentions public.”

He is not alone in voicing such concerns. His view that a fine reputation is no longer sufficient to guarantee the survival of Swiss banking in an increasingly competitive world is shared by many financial analysts and bankers.