Swiss banks will oppose “indiscriminate” probes of bank accounts in the hunt for tax cheats even after agreeing to new rules on more transparency, an industry leader said here on Thursday.

Urs Roth, chief executive of the Swiss Bankers Association, sought to assure wealthy clients that their privacy remains protected by Swiss law, provided they are not involved in fraud.

Roth said Switzerland will provide tax information on bank clients only after receiving “justified requests” about individual cases. The subjects of the queries and the relevant banks "must be clearly identifiable" and have the right of appeal in Switzerland, he said in a speech to the Foreign Correspondents Association of Singapore.

Roth stressed: “This has nothing to do with bank secrecy but with the right of citizens to privacy. Citizens in a democracy would never allow their police forces to have an automatic right of forced entry into their homes just on the off-chance of finding some stolen goods.”

“So why should state authorities have an automatic right of forced entry into bank accounts just on the off-chance of discovering some tax evaders?”