Brussels, 11/03/2016 (Agence Europe) - By request of the Belgian justice system, the diplomatic immunity of the Director General of the European anti-fraud office (OLAF), Giovanni Kessler, has been lifted by the European Commission, the institution confirmed on Friday 11 March.
The decision to lift Kesseler's immunity was made on Wednesday 2 March (in full discretion), during the weekly meeting of the college of European Commissioners, Commission spokesperson Margaritis Schinas announced. It was made “following a request of the Prosecutor of the Belgian King, on the basis of Protocol 7 on the privileges and immunities of the European Union and in line with the duty to cooperate with the national judicial authorities”.
The Commissioner for the Budget and Human Resources, Kristalina Georgieva, said that the lifting of the diplomatic immunity of this senior official of the Commission was justified in light of the factual elements put forward by the Prosecutor of the Belgian King. The lifting of Kessler's diplomatic immunity “allow the Belgian legal authorities to do their jobs”, Schinas added. This does not call the presumption of innocence into question, the Commission stressed. Furthermore, the institution is “offering all the legal support necessary and all the advice it may provide this senior official with in the defence of his interests before the Belgian court, as provided for by article 24 of the statute”.
The Belgian federal public prosecutor's office called for Kessler's immunity to be lifted one year ago, so that it could question him in the 'Dalli' case (see EUROPE 11313), relating to the former European Commissioner for Health, who left his position in 2012. He had been accused of suspicious relationships with various players in the tobacco industry. When Dalli brought an action against the company Swedish Match, which was behind his disgrace, for defamation of character, the federal prosecutor wanted to hear what the OLAF boss had to say to clarify his role in the story.
A number of individuals suspect that the OLAF boss was involved in a trap which was set by the tobacco industry for Dalli, in the hope that the anti-tobacco directive, which was being revised at the time, would be weakened.
“A bombshell”. José Bové (Greens/EFA, France) described the lifting of Kessler's diplomatic immunity as a “bombshell”. He has been accusing Kessler, since October 2012, of having carried out an “illegal and botched investigation” into Dalli. “This decision will allow the Belgian police to interview Giovanni Kessler on many grey areas that still exist on this investigation. I have for several days had in my possession the full recording of the questioning of Mrs Gayle Kimberley that was behind the scandal. This audio tape reveals the error committed by Giovanni Kessler in the exercise of his duties”, Bové said in a press release published on Friday 11 March. He said that Catherine Day, former Secretary General of the Commission, “should be interviewed by the Belgian judiciary to explain the role she played in this affair. Under these conditions, the diplomatic immunity of Mr Barroso should also be lifted to allow him to provide the Belgian judicial authorities with his witness statement”. Readers may recall that the supervisory committee of OLAF had itself highlighted irregularities in the OLAF investigation (see EUROPE 10838). (Original version in French by Lionel Changeur)