According to both Prime Minister Xavier Bettel and spokespeople for Luxembourg's judiciary, there are no legal grounds to prevent the extradition of Frank Schneider to the United States of America.

MPs Fernand Kartheiser and Fred Keup from the Alternative Democratic Reform Party (ADR) recently filed a parliamentary enquiry concerned with the extradition of Frank Schneider, a former agent for the Intelligence Service of the Luxembourgish State (SREL), to the United States.

Both ADR politicians thus wanted to know whether Minister of State Xavier Bettel plans on intervening and whether it would be in Luxembourg's best interest to prevent a former intelligence agent with sensitive information on the Grand Duchy from falling into the hands of another country.

Schneider stands accused of fraud and money laundering in connection to the 'OneCoin' case. With the help of a pyramid scheme, he is said to have helped cheat millions of people and accumulated a sum of more than $4 billion. The exact role that Schneider played in this entire process can only be addressed in trial. The former SREL agent was arrested in France in 2021 on the basis of an arrest warrant from the US.

In his response to the enquiry, PM Bettel explained that neither he nor the government have any legal grounds to prevent the extradition of a Luxembourgish citizen arrested on foreign territory.

Upon enquiry, Luxembourg's judiciary noted that the case has been entirely treated by US authorities, which means that they have no access to the any of the files. To request an extradition to the Grand Duchy, a thorough enquiry would have had to been made, including evidence for a crime with territorial purview.

Conform with European law, French authorities offered to transfer Schneider to Luxembourg following his arrest on French territory last year. However, the prosecutor's office refused to issue a European arrest warrant since there was no case against Schneider in Luxembourg.

Schneider, who still asserts his innocence, has since criticised the national judiciary for not being interested in his case. Upon enquiry from our colleagues at RTL, he said that he has been one of many consultants to 'crypto queen' Ruja Ignatova since 2015. His firm, Sandstone, only had a contract with her Bulgarian firm One Network Service and never participated in the promotion of OneCoin.

The former SREL agents admits that he fears a trial in the US due to the expensive defence costs, which he cannot afford. He is also at risk of being sentenced to 40 years in prison.

The way things stand at the moment, Schneider's extradition could only be contested by the Council of State. If that were to happen, the French government would be expected to take a "competent" decision in the matter, noted PM Bettel in his response.