REYKJAVIK (AFP) - An official probe Monday said several former leaders, including an ex-premier, were guilty of "extreme negligence" in the lead-up to the 2008 financial crisis that crippled Iceland's economy.

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Former prime minister "Geir H. Haarde, Arni M. Mathiessen, former finance minister, and Bjoergvin G. Sigurdsson, former minister of banking, showed extreme negligence before the fall of the three banks in October 2008," the Special Investigation Commission (SIC) wrote.

The report, more than 2,000 pages long, was commissioned by lawmakers at the end of 2008, shortly after Iceland's three major banks went bust, dragging down its once booming financial sector and sending the Icelandic krona plunging.

David Oddsson, another former prime minister who was head of Iceland's central bank at the time of the economic implosion, was also blamed for the deep crisis, as were his fellow bank directors at the time and the former head of the country's Financial Supervisory Authority.

Oddsson and Haarde had in the spring of 2008 hidden information from relevant ministers and the government about the country's upcoming financial crisis, SIC committee chief Pall Hreinsson told reporters in Reykjavik.

"In April 2008, there were at least five meetings between the prime minister, the minister of finance and the foreign minister and directors of the central bank on the banks' situation and the situation of the economy," he said.

Banking minister Sigurdsson had however not been informed of "anything that went on in those meetings and the government was not shown any notes from these meetings," he added.

Iceland's previous prosperity had been heavily based on its robust banking sector and the country consequently suffered a major macro-economic blow when its key lending institutions were laid low by the global financial meltdown.

Before that happened, the country's three major banks, Kaupthing, Landsbanki and Glitnir, had seen their assets swell from equalling 100 percent of Iceland's gross domestic product (GDP) in 2004 to 923 percent at the end of 2007, according to figures from the International Monetary Fund (IMF).

"In seven years the three banks became 20 times bigger and that is the main reason for the fall of the economy," SIC committee member Sigridur Benediktsdottir told reporters.

The former bank heads had also helped bring about the downfall, she said as she presented the widely anticipated report.

"According to all the loan-books from the banks, all the former owners of the three banks had inappropriate loans from the banks," she added.

Committee chief Hreinsson meanwhile said a summary of the report had been handed to prosecutors along with suggestions on how to proceed.

Massive protests over the crisis at the end of 2008 and beginning of 2009 forced Haarde of the rightwing Independence Party and his coalition government from power, ushering in the first leftwing cabinet in Iceland's history.

Former central bank chief Oddsson, also a former Independence Party prime minister, who was widely blamed for the financial mess, was pushed out early last year.