BERLIN, Oct. 24 (Xinhua) -- German defense minister Ursula von der Leyen admitted Wednesday that her department made mistakes when hiring external Information Technology (IT) advisors, following accusations by the Federal Audit Office that she misappropriated federal funds in the process.
"The way in which consulting services were commissioned was partially not sound," von der Leyen told the German magazine Stern. Von der Leyen announced she would respond to the issue by creating a new centralized public tender authority within the defense ministry.
German media earlier reported that German prosecutors had launched preliminary investigations into alleged irregularities in the use of external advisors by the department which von der Leyen has led since 2013.
Back in September, an unnamed insider filed charges against von der Leyen for purposefully creating a relationship of "false self-employment" with external advisors. Under German law, posing as an independent contractor while only having a single long-term client is considered as false self-employment.
While promising to right any mistakes in hiring practices, von der Leyen insisted that her ministry would continue to rely on contractors for IT expertise as a logistical necessity. She also defended her former secretary of state Katrin Suder who was depicted as playing an instrumental role in the affair surrounding external advisors after first joining the defense ministry in 2014 to help complete a long-standing program of armed forces reform.
"Ms. Suder chose to put herself in the service of the country as an end in itself and created transparency systematically," von der Leyen told Stern.
In spite of von der Leyen's pledge to clarify the issue, Tobias Lindner, defense policy spokesperson for the Green party parliamentary faction expressed doubts on Wednesday as to whether von der Leyen's announcement of ministerial reforms could be taken seriously.
