A vice president of the European Parliament is said to have been bribed by the emirate. EU visa facilitation for Qataris is off the table.
Brussels/Strasbourg. When the World Cup semi-final match between Argentina and Croatia kicks off in the Emirate of Qatar on Tuesday, the bars and pubs in Brussels’ European Quarter will be particularly busy. But the number one topic of conversation among the watching EU bureaucrats shouldn’t be Messi’s duel against Modrić, but the no less exciting duel between Eva Kaili and Belgium. On Friday, Belgian investigators arrested the Vice President of the European Parliament on suspicion of “gang corruption and money laundering” – and thus started the biggest EU scandal in years.
1 Who is Eva Kaili and what are the Belgian investigators accusing her of?
Until she was expelled on Friday, the former moderator belonged to the Greek Pasok party. In the European Parliament, where she has held a mandate since 2014, she was one of 14 Vice Presidents responsible for relations with NATO, industrial policy and energy, among other things. The social democrat is suspected of having been bribed by Qatar to influence decisions in favor of the emirate. The Belgian investigators are said to have secured 600,000 euros in cash in addition to PCs and mobile phones on Friday.