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Chile President Bachelet testifies in tax probe into daughter-in-law

Chile's President Michelle Bachelet delivers the annual State of the Nation address at the national congress building in Valparaiso city, Chile, May 21, 2016. REUTERS/Rodrigo Garrido

SANTIAGO (Reuters) - Chile's President Michelle Bachelet voluntarily testified earlier this week with the national prosecutor's office as part of a probe into alleged tax crimes by her daughter-in-law Natalia Compagnon, the government said late on Friday. While Bachelet has not been accused of any wrongdoing, the case has been one of a number of high-profile money-in-politics scandals to come to light over the last year, sowing discontent among Chileans and dragging the President's popularity to all-time lows. Interior Minister Jorge Burgos disclosed on Friday that he informed Bachelet that he had received a request from the prosecutor's office for the President to voluntarily testify in the probe. "I'm available to testify immediately," Bachelet said, according to Burgos. A Chilean court in January officially pegged Compagnon as a criminal suspect, as investigators look into allegations that she issued false tax declarations, misrepresented her income, and issued fraudulent invoices relating to a real estate concern she half-owns. (Reporting by Antonio de la Jara and Anthony Esposito, Editing by Franklin Paul)