Brussels, 20/11/2003 (Agence Europe) - Commissioners Viviane Reding, Pedro Solbes and Chris Patten will be given a hearing on Monday and the week following Parliament's budgetary control committee in order to lift the veil from certain aspects of the Eurostat affair, which still remains obscure even after the final report of the Commission's internal auditing service. Ms Reding will be providing an explanation on 24 November on the secret Eurostat accounts set up in cooperation with the Official Publications Office of the European Communities. Messrs Solbes and Patten will be heard on 1st and 2nd December. Patten will be questioned about the justification of a suspicious contract signed by his Directorate General in December 2001 with the CESD company (for a population census in Macedonia). This was one of the companies whose contract the Commission terminated following the Eurostat affair (see also p 15).