The European Commissioner for Home Affairs, Ylva Johansson, reacted on Tuesday 13 December to the alleged corruption scandal that has rocked the European Parliament since Friday 9 December (see EUROPE 13082/1). On this occasion, she also discussed some future measures to be taken in the fight against corruption.
“We must have zero tolerance for corruption. These allegations are extremely serious, even if the presumption of innocence prevails. (...) We have to rebuild the fight against corruption and we have to put our own house in order first, our standards must always be the highest”, Johansson began.
To achieve this, the Commissioner stressed the importance of improving the accountability mechanism and removing the discrepancies between national authorities in this area, which “undermine the fight against corruption”.
In addition, she announced without specifying a deadline, the Commission will present new legislation “to penalise all forms of corruption in all Member States, trading in influence, illicit enrichment, abuse of power, abuse of social assets. This will have to include tough pan-European sanctions”, she added.
In addition, work should also be carried out by the European Commission on the issue of the ethics body. On this point, Johansson said, the Commission is in favour of a body that would be common to all institutions, such as the Parliament, the Council of the EU, the Commission, the Court of Justice of the EU, the European Central Bank and the European Court of Auditors, but also to advisory bodies, “without exception”.
Following the Commissioner’s speech, MEPs speaking from the rostrum were again unanimous in their condemnation of the alleged actions of the now former Vice-President of the European Parliament Eva Kaili (S&D, Greek) (see separate news item), who is currently under arrest in Brussels in connection with the case.
Some also took the opportunity to insist, as did Greens/EFA group co-president Terry Reintke (Germany), that the resolution to be put to the vote in the European Parliament on Thursday, on the scandal of potential corruption of some MEPs by Qatar, should be firm and send a clear message.
“We must act and be very clear, including in the resolution we adopt. We need to be clear about the condemnation of the facts as well as about the investigation and prevention”, she said. (Original version in French by Thomas Mangin)