The Condor plane with CDU MP Karin Strenz on board took off from Varadero, Cuba and was supposed to land in Frankfurt am Main. During the flight, the 53-year-old collapsed, as the spokesman for the CDU state group Mecklenburg-Western Pomerania, Eckhardt Rehberg, announced to the German press agency. Due to the medical emergency, the pilot of the Boeing 767-300 decided to make an unscheduled landing at Shannon Airport, Ireland. From there, the politician was brought to Limerick University Hospital, according to the Irish news portal “The Clare Herald”. But the medics couldn’t help her anymore. An acute heart problem is suspected. An autopsy should provide clarity.
According to Rehberg, Strenz was traveling with her husband. It was not about a business trip on behalf of the German Bundestag, said a spokesman for the parliament according to dpa. Furthermore, according to a group spokesman, she was not for the CDU / CSU parliamentary group in Cuba.
The politician had been a member of the German Bundestag since 2009 and retained her mandate when she was last suspected of corruption. Among other things, she sat on the Defense Committee. In addition to the mandate, she worked as a consultant.
Suspicion of bribery and money laundering
At the end of January 2020, the Bundestag lifted Karin Strenz’s immunity at the request of the Frankfurt am Main public prosecutor’s office. As a result, there were house searches of the CDU politician and the former CSU parliamentarian Eduard Lintner in connection with the flow of money from the authoritarian ruled Azerbaijan.
The Frankfurt public prosecutor spoke of around four million euros that flowed through British mailbox companies and Baltic accounts between 2008 and 2016. The investigation was made for bribery and money laundering.
As early as 2019, the Presidium of the Bundestag imposed a fine of 20,000 euros on Strenz for reporting additional income from Azerbaijan too late.
se / ack (dpa, clareherald.com, image)
Note: The article was subsequently supplemented with the information that it was not a business trip on behalf of the Bundestag or the parliamentary group.
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