Berlin - Germany's ruling Social Democrats threatened Dr Helmut Kohl with fines or even "coercive detention" yesterday unless the former chancellor reveals the names of campaign donors who handed him large cash contributions.
Dr Kohl made a dramatic confession on Thursday that he violated German laws by accepting secret cash donations of nearly two million marks (£806,000) between 1993 and 1998. Dr Kohl refused to identify the donors, but said the payments were not bribes.
Mr Frank Hofmann, SPD leader of a parliamentary inquiry into the affair that has badly tarnished Dr Kohl's standing as an elder statesman, said Dr Kohl was breaking the law and the inquiry would use all powers available to learn the names of the donors.