Headed by the former chief
\nof the Romanian National Anticorruption Directorate Laura Codru\u0163a K\u00f6vesi, the European Public Prosecutor’s
\nOffice starts operating on 1st June. This new body aimed at fighting
\nfraud withing the bloc is based in Luxembourg and will carry out its
\ninvestigations and prosecutions fully independently from the Commission and the
\nother EU institutions and bodies, as well as from member states, 22 of which are
\ntaking part in this form of consolidated cooperation. <\/p>\n
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This is the first supranational prosecutor’s office
\ninvestigating and prosecuting fraud related to expenditure and incomes, VAT (when
\nit involves two or more member states and causes losses of at least 10 million
\neuros), money laundering of funds resulting from defrauding the EU budget,
\nactive and passive corruption and embezzlement that affects the EU’s financial
\ninterests. This new body is also able to investigate and prosecute
\nparticipation in a criminal organisation whose activities result in offences
\nagainst the EU budget, or any other illegal activity that is inextricably linked
\nto an offence against the EU budget. <\/p>\n
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The head of this new body, who says there are no clean
\ncountries, said in an interview to the Spanish news agency EFE that she is
\nvery proud to play the lead role in the historic moment represented by the inauguration
\nof this new European institution and warned of the high risk of offences linked
\nto the European fund for post-pandemic recovery. Set up in order to investigate
\noffences that affect the EU budget, the new European Public Prosecutor’s Office
\nis an instrument aimed at protecting the bloc’s economic interests, which is
\nwhy it should be strong, effective and efficient, K\u00f6vesi also said. She estimated
\ncorruption, misappropriation of funds and fraud in its many forms cause annual
\nlosses to the EU budget of some 500 million euros. This financial haemorrhaging
\nmay worsen in the context of the pandemic, with the community bloc establishing,
\nthrough loans accessed by the European Commission, recovery funds out of which
\nmember states can access grants and loans based on national recovery and resilience
\nplans approved by the Commission. <\/p>\n
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The new body has at its disposal an annual budget of
\n45 million euros to identify and investigate acts of corruption. K\u00f6vesi said
\nthe office can employ 140 prosecutors and added that 50 financial analysts and
\nexperts are also needed given the challenge of conducting investigations in 22
\nmember states, with 22 different criminal codes and procedures. Five member
\nstates, namely Poland, Denmark, Hungary, Sweden and Ireland are not taking part
\nin the new European Public Prosecutor’s Office as a result of a political decision,
\nwhile Finland and Slovenia are yet to appoint their prosecutors. (CM)<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
EU’s new anti-fraud body, the European Public Prosecutors Office starts on 1st June, with a delay of a few months.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":108,"featured_media":86770,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[37738],"tags":[29120,30424,29845],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-89139","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-today-in-the-news","tag-eu","tag-fraud","tag-prosecution"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n