Former European Commissioner John Dalli.

Former European Commissioner John Dalli is not in any way connected with the Swiss Leaks scandal contrary to the impression that may have been given by a heading that appeared in Times of Malta yesterday.

The heading, ‘No suspension for Gatt and Dalli over Swiss accounts’, may have incorrectly implied that Mr Dalli held a secret HSBC Swiss bank account when in fact this was not the case.

Over the weekend ex-ministers Michael Falzon and Ninu Zammit were suspended by the Nationalist Party after it had emerged that the two men had held undeclared amounts of money in secret HSBC Swiss bank accounts.

To date, they are the only Maltese – together with former Enemalta chairman Tancred Tabone – to have been linked with what has become known as the Swiss Leaks scandal, which broke after international media outlets published leaked HSBC files revealing misconduct on a global level at the bank’s Swiss subsidiary.

After Mr Falzon and Mr Zammit were suspended from the PN, Opposition leader Simon Busuttil was asked if he had also considered suspending from the party two other former ministers: Austin Gatt, who had held a Swiss account which he failed to declare before the last election, and Mr Dalli, who in 2013 faced accusations – which he has always strenuously denied – that he travelled to the Bahamas as part of an effort to arrange the transfer of millions of euros. However, in yesterday’s heading, which also made reference to Dr Gatt, Mr Dalli’s name was erroneously linked to the term “Swiss accounts”.

In a statement, Mr Dalli accused Times of Malta of “malicious reporting”, saying the newspaper was trying to implicate him in the Swiss Leaks story. Mr Dalli said: “When the lie about the money in the Bahamas was published [by the International Herald Tribune] and the people at Times of Malta tried to spin as hard as they could, I wrote to the European Parliament offering MEPs a power of attorney to check with every bank in the world whether I had any accounts.

“Today [yesterday] I instructed my lawyer to file criminal and civil libel proceedings against Times of Malta over the malicious report.”

Mr Dalli called on the government to acquire the HSBC Swiss Leaks list so that nobody would be subjected to “blackmail or manipulation as happened in this case”.

Mr Falzon suspended himself from the PN on Saturday after releasing a statement on his Swiss account, while Mr Zammit was suspended by Dr Busuttil when The Malta Independent revealed that he also held a Swiss account.

This newspaper apologises to Mr Dalli for any inconvenience caused by any inadvertent implication that he was connected with the Swiss Leaks scandal.