Finance Minister Edward Scicluna must come clean about what he knew about former FIAU officials and their work, activists from the Civil Society Network have said. 

In a statement issued on Saturday morning, the CSN said that it was concerned that Prof. Scicluna seemed to be dodging questions about whether he had ever discussed Jonathan Ferris and Charles Cronin with police or Financial Intelligence Analysis Unit officials.

Both Mr Ferris and Mr Cronin were fired by the FIAU in June while still under probation. The FIAU, which falls under Prof. Scicluna's ministerial remit, insists that the sackings were due to performance-related issues and were unrelated to investigations into top government officials.  

Just 10 days before the two were sacked, Prof. Scicluna had openly asked whether FIAU reports which had been made public were "written to be leaked". 

In its statement on Saturday, the CSN said Malta's Finance Minister was duty-bound to say whether the minister had ever discussed Mr Ferris and Mr Cronin, and if so who he discussed them with and whether he did so before or after their employment with the FIAU was terminated. 

WATCH: Were FIAU reports written to be leaked, asks minister

The CSN argued that the answers would help establish the truth about the two sackings as well as the sudden departures of police commissioner Michael Cassar and FIAU chief Manfred Galdes.

"A lack of will to do this would mean that Institutional Omerta' exists in Malta," the CSN said. 

Mr Cassar quit the police force in April 2016 citing "health reasons", while Mr Galdes quietly left the FIAU a few months later without saying why. In February of this year, he told MEPs that the FIAU had "fully investigated" cases related to the Panama Papers while he was in charge.