ROME, Oct 6, 2008 (AFP) - Milan prosecutors are seeking a 13-year jail term for Calisto Tanzi, founder and former chief executive of the Italian food conglomerate Parmalat, the Italian news agency ANSA reported Monday.

Dubbed Europe's Enron, Parmalat collapsed in 2003 when 14 billion euros went missing from the group's accounts (22 billion dollars at current exchange rates).

Tanzi stands accused of manipulating the company's share price, assisting in false accounting and hindering audits.

Prosecutor Eugenio Fusco said Tanzi should not be allowed to argue for mitigating circumstances in court and wants sentences from six to three and a half years for eight other suspects implicated in the case, ANSA reported.

This trial, the first in the Parmalat case, started in Milan September 2005. Aside from Tanzi, a number of his accomplices were also in the dock.

Another prosecutor, Franceso Greco, likened the crash of Parmalat to 'an ugly Mafia scandal'.

He drew parallels between the company's plight and the current financial crisis, highlighting the involvement of banks in the scandal.

'The breakdown of the international financial system in recent days is the best example that prosecutors' suspicions were right and that the banks were involved in the collapse of Parmalat,' he said, according to ANSA.

Both the prosecution and Tanzi's lawyers accused the banks having sold Parmalat shares so that they could safeguard their own investments in the group, fully aware of its insolvency.

A second trial opened in January 2008, also in Milan. Four foreign banks are accused of share price manipulation and disseminating false financial information: American firms Citigroup and Morgan Stanley, Germany's Deutsche Bank and Switzerland's UBS.

The largest trial linked to the company's collapse in terms of number of suspects and sentences only started last March in the northern city of Parma, site of the company's headquarters.

The trial involves 55 defendants, including Tanzi, on charges of bankruptcy fraud and criminal association.

The food conglomerate employed 36,000 people worldwide at the time. Its collapse wiped out the savings of 135,000 people in Italy.