Polish PM says central bank chief didn't break in leaked tape

WARSAW (Reuters) - Polish central bank governor Marek Belka committed no crime in a private conversation with a government minister that was leaked to the public, Prime Minister Donald Tusk said on Monday, easing pressure on Belka to resign.

In taped extracts of his conversation with Interior Minister Bartlomiej Sienkiewicz, Belka used an expletive to describe central bank colleagues and said he would help the government with its economic troubles if the finance minister were removed.

The zloty fell slightly against the euro early on Monday, with markets worried that the leak could bring down Belka. He is seen as a safe pair of hands by investors with assets in Poland, the European Union's sixth-biggest economy.

Under Polish rules, central bank governors cannot be removed unless they are convicted of crimes or incapacitated. Sources close to the government said for now it seemed unlikely Belka would have to resign.

Prosecutor-General Andrzej Seremet said on Monday his investigators had reviewed the audio tape, published by the news magazine Wprost, and found no initial evidence that either of the two men had committed a crime.

In his first detailed comments since the tape emerged, Tusk told a news conference: "I second the prosecutor's opinion that an initial analysis does not indicate a break of law.

"Irrespective of how nasty was their way of expressing their opinions, they were talking about how to help the country, not how to harm the country, about joint actions in the times of crisis," Tusk said.

Opposition politicians had said the two men were caught on the tape cooking up improper deals between the central bank and government - branches of the state which are supposed to be independent of each other.

A few months after the conversation in the restaurant, the finance minister whose removal Belka had mentioned, Jacek Rostowski, left the government in a reshuffle. Belka said on Sunday this was just a coincidence.

Tusk said the exchanges captured on tape between Belka and Sienkiewicz were a theoretical discussion about potential risks to economic stability in Poland, and that most of the scenarios they talked about never materialised.

Tusk also said he saw no need to fire his interior minister, or for the whole government to resign, as demanded by the opposition.

(Reporting by Michal Janusz and Jakub Iglewski; Writing by Marcin Goclowski; Editing by Christian Lowe, Larry King)