The corruption plot in the European Parliament that splashes to Qatar and Morocco, and whose scope is still not fully known, has clouded the last summit of 2022 that the leaders of the community institutions and the heads of State and Government of the European Union celebrate in Brussels.
Eva Kaili44 years old and who served as vice president of the European Parliamentwas arrested along with several other people last weekend following investigations by the Belgian prosecutor’s office for a case of bribery to influence positions in the legislature.
The Social Democrat MEP is accused of receiving bribes from Qatar to defend the interests of the emirate in the European Parliament, in a case that various European media outlets call ‘Qatargate’.
The scandal halted the filing of a visa waiver report with Qatar and Kuwait in a session scheduled for last Monday in the European Parliament. In the light of the investigations, this report must be sent back to commission,” Parliament Speaker Roberta Metsola said.
Qatar has firmly denied the accusations, but judicial sources in Belgium confirmed to the press that it was this country that was at the center of the Belgian investigation.
As a result of the spectacular scandal, the plenary session of the European Parliament dismissed from his post Eva Kailiin a vote that had 625 votes in favor, once morest just one once morest and two abstentions.
Search She was also expelled from the Greek Socialist Party (Pasok-Kinal), and removed from the Social Democratic bloc in the European Parliament.
Among those arrested for the scandal are the couple of SearchFrancesco Giorgi, and Italian ex-European MP Pier Antonio Panzeri.
The Belgian federal prosecutor’s office announced on Monday that in raids carried out in three different places it seized a significant amount of cash.
According to that source, 600,000 euros (regarding $630,000) were found in the house of former Italian MEP Pier Antonio Panzeri; 150,000 euros in the apartment of Searchand 750,000 in a suitcase in a hotel room hired by the father of the vice president.
Police also raided an office of the European Parliament in Brussels to seize computer data from a dozen officials.
The MEP was to appear this Wednesday before a court in Brussels that had to decide whether she would continue in prison. According to her lawyer, Search he was unable to appear before a court in Brussels because of a strike at the prison where he is held. Therefore, at the request of the defense, it was agreed to postpone the hearing until December 22. The other three people arrested since Sunday in this case appeared before the Brussels Council Chamber, which must decide on their continued detention.
Who is Eva Kaili?
Originally from Thessaloniki, the second city of Greece, Eva Search He launched into politics when he was 20 years old. In 1998 she became a municipal councilor for the city. For a time, she was seen as a rising star of the socialist Pasok-Kinal party.
After obtaining an architecture diploma, he studied international and European relations and took journalism courses. Between 2004 and 2007, Search presents the news from one of the main private channels in the country, Mega. That same year, at just 29 years old, she is elected to the Greek Parliament. She becomes the youngest deputy in the Pasok party.
In 2014, she was elected as a member of the European Parliament by the Socialists and Democrats (S&D) group, a mandate that she retained in the 2019 European elections. In January 2022 she became one of the vice-presidents of the European legislature. Search he was part of the delegation in charge of developing relations between the European Union and the Arabian Peninsula.
Search He traveled to Qatar at the beginning of November, where he congratulated himself, together with the Qatari Minister of Labour, on the emirate’s reforms in this sector.
“Today, the World Cup in Qatar is concrete proof of how sports diplomacy can lead to a historic transformation of a country whose reforms have inspired the Arab world,” he declared in the European Chamber on November 22.
Kaili’s boyfriend confesses
The Italian Francesco Giorgi, sentimental partner of the former vice-president of the European Parliament Eva Kaili, has confessed his involvement in the bribery plot in the European Parliament and has pointed to several involved, according to the Belgian newspaper Le Soir reported on Thursday.
Giorgi, 35 years old and father of a two-year-old girl with Kaili, 44, admitted his guilt before the police and before the investigating judge in the interrogations to which he has been subjected by the Belgian authorities in the scandal that broke out on last Friday.
The parliamentary assistant, whom the judge decided this Wednesday to keep in pretrial detention, has pointed to the Italian former MEP Pier Antonio Panzieri as the mastermind of the plot, from whom the police seized 700,000 euros at his home and who is also accused and is in pretrial detention . Panzieri’s wife and daughter have been detained in Italy and Belgium has requested his surrender.
The young Italian has also accused two other Social Democratic MEPs: the Belgian Marc Tarabella, whose address had already been searched by the authorities in the framework of the investigation, but who was at large; and the Italian Andrea Cozzolino, for whom Giorgi worked as an assistant.
Kaili, for her part, is in pretrial detention and is scheduled to appear before a judge on the 22nd, following not being able to appear this Wednesday due to a strike by civil servants. In the records, the police found hundreds of thousands of euros in cash at the home of Kaili and Giorgi, with whom she has had a relationship for five years.
The agents also surprised Kaili’s father leaving a Brussels hotel with bags of money, a circumstance that allowed them to act despite the parliamentary immunity of Greek politics, understanding that he was committing a flagrant crime.
Le Soir, the newspaper that together with Kanack gave the scoop on the scandal, adds that Giorgi did not accuse the Belgian MEP Maria Arena, who has not yet been reached by the police operation but who has made public that one of her assistants in the Eurochamber is also accused in the plot.
The new data revealed by that newspaper increasingly points to Morocco, not just Qatar, as the origin of the bribes. He specifically points to the Moroccan ambassador to Poland, Abderrahim Atmoun, and two Moroccan secret service agents whom he does not identify. (With information from EFE and AFP)
