EU parliament vows graft crackdown, as MEP faces second probe

The European Parliament will launch “a wide-ranging reform package” to clean up the legislature amid a graft scandal linked to World Cup host Qatar, its president said Thursday.

Roberta Metsola said the plan would strengthen the parliament’s whistle-blower protection systems, ban all “unofficial friendship groups” and review how to enforce its own rules.

She said she would lead the changes, which are to include “a complete and in-depth look at how we interact with third countries”, and that the package would be ready “in the new year”.

At the same time, EU lawmakers called for representatives of Qatar to be temporarily barred from the legislature’s premises.

Four suspects — including Eva Kaili, an MEP and former European Parliament vice president under Metsola — have been charged with “criminal organisation, corruption and money laundering”. The other two were released.

Through her lawyers Kaili, a 44-year-old former TV newsreader, has denied any wrongdoing and suggested that her partner and fellow accused Francesco Giorgi has questions to answer.

A series of searches at the homes and offices of politicians, lobbyists and parliamentary assistants turned up around 1.5 million euros ($1.6 million) in cash.

A Belgian judicial source said 600,000 euros were found at the home of MEP-turned-lobbyist Pier Panzeri, 150,000 euros in Kaili’s flat and 750,000 in her father’s hotel room.

– Greek probe –

Meanwhile, in Kaili’s Greek homeland, the Athens financial prosecutor’s office has opened a preliminary corruption and money laundering investigation, a judicial source said on Thursday.

“The financial prosecutor… has ordered the opening of an investigation into taking bribes and money laundering,” said the source.

Two deputy prosecutors have been assigned to the case and asked Belgium for copies of documents and information on the progress of the investigation.

But Greek prosecutors will await the results of the ongoing investigation in Brussels before deciding whether to open a criminal proceedings in Greece.

The Qatar government has rejected any claims of wrongdoing as “gravely misinformed”.

The probe and the charges have shaken the European Parliament, and put its interactions with lobbyists and representatives of non-EU countries under intense scrutiny.

Metsola has sought to frame the scandal as an attack on “European democracy” and said that take was endorsed by EU leaders who gathered for a Brussels summit on Thursday.

– Tighten rules –

She also emphasised that the investigation was being carried out by Belgian law enforcement authorities, and the parliament was giving them “full and open cooperation”.

But she acknowledged that “the rules that we have already can be tightened can be improved” when it came to monitoring transactions and trips by the parliament’s 705 lawmakers, and the lobbying efforts they were subject to by non-EU countries.

“Certain things that happened in this context will not be allowed to happen again,” she said.

Metsola said she would make a proposal after the European Parliament’s call for representatives of Qatar to have access suspended while the criminal probe is under way.

MEPs sitting in Strasbourg formalised the demand through a vote carried 541 to two that also expressed concern about the scandal.

Metsola has the final say on applying any access ban.