The prime minister's commissioner in charge of investigating the suspected illegal privatisation of state-owned land under the previous governments has accused former prime ministers Gordon Bajnai and Ferenc Gyurcsany of misleading the public prosecutor during questioning about the project, which is believed to have caused major losses to the state.

The two former prime ministers issued statements on Wednesday via their offices rejecting the charges.

Gyula Budai, the commissioner appointed by Viktor Orban, head of the Fidesz centre-right government, said he had acquired several letters from the correspondence between the former heads of government and the project's Israeli investor, as well as the minutes of a government session from May 2008 which pointed to wrongdoing.

The issue at stake is a tract of land near the village of Sukoro, next to Lake Velence, in central Hungary which was sold for a planned large casino development.

The documents, he insisted, proved that Bajnai and Gyurcsany "bore false witness" during their interviews with the prosecutor, Budai said.

Bajnai's statement said that Budai had falsely accused both ex-prime ministers, and that Bajnai himself had cooperated with the prosecutor and replied to every question with appended witness statements.

Bajnai's statement said that the one-billion-dollar planned investment would have served local tourism and created 3,000 jobs around the lake. He added that, as prime minister, he initiated an investigation in connection with an exchange of land which was part of the deal.

Gyurcsany's secretariat told MTI that he flatly rejected the charges, without giving any further comment.