Spain court revokes passport of ex-IMF chief Rodrigo Rato
Spain has revoked the passport of the former managing director of the International Monetary Fund (IMF), Rodrigo Rato, as he faces charges of fraud.
A Madrid judge had Rato’s passport confiscated after questioning him for nearly three hours about details of his personal wealth.
The former Spanish finance minister is being investigated for suspected tax evasion, money laundering and concealing personal assets.
The judge ordered Rato to appear before the court once a month, but he allowed him to travel within the European Union if he wished so by using his Spanish identity card.
Rato, aged 66, was the finance minister, under former Prime Minister Jose Maria Aznar, from 1996 to 2004, and headed the IMF from 2004 to 2007.
He is also being investigated for alleged accounting irregularities during his time as chief executive of the Spanish banking conglomerate Bankia from 2010 until his resignation in 2012 amid concerns of solvency of the firm.
In that year, Bloomberg Businessweek cited Rato as the worst chief executive of the year.
He is also under investigation in a third probe for alleged spending sprees on company credit cards by him and other former managers of Bankia.
Rato studied in a Jesuit school and continued higher education in law at a Spanish university and business in the United States.
Rato has denied any wrongdoing in all the cases. None of the investigations have yet gone to trial.
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