Tycoon Nadir held over bail breach

FORMER Polly Peck tycoon Asil Nadir was arrested in London yesterday for an alleged breach of his court bail conditions.

Nadir returned to the UK voluntarily in the summer to stand trial on theft and fraud charges next year.

A Metropolitan Police spokesman said: "I can confirm that a 69 year-old man has been arrested at an address in central London for breaching his bail terms."

The Turkish Cypriot businessman, who was a big donor to the Conservative Party, returned in August from his home in northern Cyprus, which has no extradition treaty with Britain.

He is due to stand trial next year on charges linked to the failure of his Polly Peck group, which folded in 1990 with debts of 1.3 billion.

The collapse of Polly Peck was one of Britain's biggest business failures. It shook the Conservative government of then prime minister John Major and led to the resignation of Northern Ireland minister Michael Mates, who had links to the businessman.

Nadir had transformed the business during the 1980s from an ailing textiles firm into a conglomerate that included the Del Monte fruit business.

Its share price rose more than 100 times during the boom years, before crashing when the Serious Fraud Office began investigating the company's finances in 1990.

Nadir was originally charged with 66 offences of theft alleging a 34 million fraud following the collapse of his Polly Peck empire.

He fled in 1993 to northern Cyprus before the counts - put into fewer condensed charges - could be put to him at trial.

After flying back to Britain, Nadir said he was innocent and had returned to clear his name.