Deutsche Post chief offers to resign amid tax fraud investigation

BERLIN, Germany (CNN) -- The head of Germany's Deutsche Post submitted his resignation Friday, a Ministry of Finance spokesman said, a day after German police searched his offices as part of an investigation into reported tax fraud.

Chief Executive Klaus Zumwinkel offered his resignation to the Deutsche Post supervisory board, and the board was meeting Friday to discuss it, ministry spokesman Torsten Albig said. Albig said his sources told him the board would most likely accept the resignation.

German media reported Thursday that police raided both Zumwinkel's office and his private villa in Cologne in connection with a suspected financial fraud. The postal chief is suspected of having placed millions of his own money in Liechtenstein banks for almost two decades to avoid German taxes, media reports said.

Albig told CNN the tax fraud investigation had been broadened, and that data on a compact disc obtained by German authorities indicated many other prominent Germans were involved in the fraud.

When asked how many names were on the CD, Albig only said, "many."

Zumwinkel served as Deutsche Post's chief executive for 18 years. He was the longest-serving CEO of any company listed on Germany's DAX financial index. E-mail to a friend

CNN's Frederik Pleitgen contributed to this report.

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