'A disgrace that makes Europe weaker’: MEPs dismayed by Qatar corruption scandal
The arrest and charging of four people in connection with an anti-corruption investigation involving members of the European Parliament and a Gulf state, said to be Qatar, could shake Brussels to its core.
Some MEPs, including vice-president Eva Kaili, have been accused of accepting large sums of money from a Gulf country reported to be World Cup hosts Qatar. Doha has denied the accusations.
The co-president of the Greens group, Philippe Lamberts, called for a parliamentary inquiry and for the issue of corruption to be brought up this week at the year's last EU assembly’s plenary session.
The EU legislator will open on Monday in what promises to be a fiery session.
Niels Fuglsang, a MEP with the Danish Social Democratic Party, pointed to the damaging effect this scandal could have on the bloc.
"If we can be bought. If members of the European Parliament and other politicians can be bought to say certain things, to vote in certain ways... It's a disgrace and it makes Europe weaker," he told Euronews.
“So, it's in everybody's interest that we get to the bottom of this and adopt rules to make sure such things must never happen [again]... That [what happened] is very wrong, and we have a big reparation job to do."
French socialists have lambasted the "very serious scandal", with MEP Manon Aubry demanding a debate on the issue and criticising "aggressive lobbying" by Qatar.
On Friday, Belgian police staged 16 raids across Brussels. Around €600,000 in cash was seized, in addition to computer equipment and mobile telephones.
They came amid investigations into suspicions of "substantial" money payments by the Gulf state to influence MEPs.
The Belgian federal prosecutor's office did not name the country, but a source close to the issue
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