{"id":4367,"date":"2020-03-11T13:35:54","date_gmt":"2020-03-11T13:35:54","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.sportsnewsforyou.com\/?p=4367"},"modified":"2020-03-11T13:35:54","modified_gmt":"2020-03-11T13:35:54","slug":"meps-call-for-olaf-chief-to-quit","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/?p=4367","title":{"rendered":"MEPs call for OLAF chief to quit"},"content":{"rendered":"<figure class=\"art\"><\/figure>\n<header>\n<h1>MEPs call for OLAF chief to quit<\/h1>\n<p class=\"subhead\">Anti-fraud agency denies allegations that witness was encouraged to lie during Maltese investigation into John Dalli.<\/p>\n<\/header>\n<footer class=\"meta\">\n<p class=\"byline\">European Voice<\/p>\n<\/footer>\n<footer class=\"meta\">\n<p>\n\t\t\tBy\t\t\t<span class=\"byline\"><br \/>\n\t\t\t\t<span class=\"vcard\">Dave Keating<\/span>\t\t\t<\/span>\n\t\t<\/p>\n<p class=\"timestamp\"><time datetime=\"2013-03-22T05:08:26+00:00\">3\/22\/13, 5:08 AM CET<\/time><\/p>\n<p class=\"updated\">Updated <time datetime=\"2014-04-13T00:50:07+00:00\">4\/13\/14, 12:50 AM CET<\/time><\/p>\n<\/footer>\n<p>Members of the European Parliament have called for the resignation of Giovanni Kessler, head of the EU&#8217;s anti-fraud agency, OLAF, over allegations of irregularities in the investigation into John Dalli, former European commissioner for health and consumer policy. &nbsp; <BR><BR>At a press conference yesterday (21 March) at which there were calls for a special committee in the European Parliament to investigate the affair, French Green MEP Jose Bov\u00e9 said that the public affairs director at Swedish Match \u2013 the tobacco company at the centre of the allegations \u2013 had claimed OLAF asked a witness to lie to Maltese investigators and the European Parliament and about a meeting with Dalli. <\/p>\n<p>In October, OLAF found that Dalli was aware that a Maltese businessman had solicited Swedish Match for payment in exchange for influencing legislation on tobacco. <BR><BR>The Commission has always said that Dalli&#8217;s resignation was a cut-and-dried case of impropriety, but there has been confusion over exactly which rules Dalli violated. MEPs have tried to get answers, but they have complained that OLAF and the European Commission are not co-operating.<\/p>\n<p>In a recorded conversation, Swedish Match\u2019s public affairs director, Johan Gabrielsson, told Bov\u00e9 that the lobbyist who arranged the meetings with the Maltese businessman, Gayle Kimberley, had lied to OLAF about a second meeting she held with Dalli. She had in fact only held one meeting with the commissioner, as Dalli himself maintained. &nbsp; <BR><BR>When OLAF learned that its report, which mentioned two meetings, was incorrect &#8211;&nbsp;after Dalli had resigned &#8211;&nbsp;the agency&nbsp;asked Swedish Match to stick to&nbsp;the original story when speaking to Maltese investigators and MEPs, Bov\u00e9 said.<\/p>\n<p>Click Here: <a href='https:\/\/www.miugolf.com\/index.php?route=product\/special' title='Golf special'>Golf special<\/a><\/p>\n<p>Bov\u00e9 also said that&nbsp;an investigation by the OLAF supervisory committee has shown that the agency recorded conversations with witnesses without their knowledge or judicial authorisation, something the agency is not permitted to do. Kessler was aware of these decisions, he claimed. &nbsp; <\/p>\n<p>However following Bov\u00e9&#8217;s comments, Swedish Match said the MEP was distorting Gabrielsson&#8217;s words. &#8220;At no point in time has OLAF put pressure on us or insinuated that we should alter our views of the events in either direction,&#8221; said a spokeman for the company. &#8220;Several statements made at the press conference were remarkable twists of the conversation between Mr Bov\u00e9 and the representative of Swedish Match.&#8221;<BR><BR>OLAF also denied that it attempted to influence the evidence given by any witness, and denied that it illegally recorded telephone conversations. <BR><BR>The agency said it \u201cregrets that selected&nbsp;items of information from confidential reports have been disclosed inaccurately, out of context and in a distorted fashion in an attempt to create a misleading impression of the facts\u201d. &nbsp; <BR><BR>In response to the new allegations, Ingeborg Gr\u00e4ssle, a centre-right German MEP, called for Kessler to resign. She said there had been a series of irregularities in the investigation. &#8220;Now the instigation of a third party, in this case Swedish Match, to make a false statement in front of Parliament adds to this record,\u201d she said. &nbsp; <BR><BR>Gr\u00e4ssle also complained that a report on the case has been delivered to the presidents of the European Parliament, European Commission and European Council, but has not been made available to MEPs. &#8220;The presidents have to stop covering up for the breaches, everything has to be put on the table now&#8221;, said Gr\u00e4ssle.<\/p>\n<\/p>\n<footer class=\"content-credits\">\n<h6>Authors:<\/h6>\n<dl class=\"vcard\">\n<dt class=\"credits-author\"><span class=\"vcard\">Dave Keating<\/span>&nbsp;<\/dt>\n<\/dl>\n<\/footer>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>MEPs call for OLAF chief to quit Anti-fraud agency denies allegations that witness was encouraged to lie during Maltese investigation into John Dalli. European Voice By Dave Keating 3\/22\/13, 5:08 AM CET Updated 4\/13\/14, 12:50 AM CET Members of the European Parliament have called for the resignation of Giovanni Kessler, head of the EU&#8217;s anti-fraud&#8230;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[3],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-4367","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4367","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=4367"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/4367\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=4367"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=4367"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/googmn.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=4367"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}