German MPs investigating claims of corruption under former chancellor Mr Helmut Kohl want to question Mr Alfred Sirven, a key figure in France's Elf oil firm scandal, just hours before he is extradited to Paris.
It is unclear whether Mr Sirven, once number two at the giant oil company and dubbed in France "the man who could bring down the republic," would co-operate in the short time before he was handed over to French officials.
Mr Silven's German lawyer said Mr Sirven was, in principle, ready to be questioned in Germany but needed time to prepare.
Mr Sirven was dramatically arrested last week after years on the run. He will join the trial in France at which he and former French foreign minister Mr Roland Dumas face corruption charges stemming from the Elf scandal.
German investigators want to question Mr Sirven about a German who helped broker Elf's purchase in 1992 of the east German refinery Leuna.
Elf, now part of merged oil group TotalFinaElf, paid some $37 million in commissions in buying the decrepit plant.
Mr Kohl, who faces criminal inquiries into party funding, and aides to the late French President Mitterrand, have denied suggestions Elf channelled French cash to Mr Kohl's re-election campaign at a time when both leaders were battling to win acceptance for Europe's new common currency.
Mr Kohl has already admitted accepting unrelated and much smaller amounts of irregular funding.
Mr Sirven has been charged in France with distributing millions of dollars from an Elf slush fund.
He has been held in Frankfurt since Saturday, after he missed a flight from Manila to Paris and took a later flight to Germany only to find German police asking extradition procedures be followed.
Reuters