European Public Prosecutor's Office to Operate from 1 June

The European Commission today officially confirmed that the Luxembourg-based European Public Prosecutor's Office (EPPO) will start operating on 1 June 2021.

The EPPO is the first supranational public prosecution office in charge of conducting criminal investigations and prosecutions for crimes against the European Union (EU) budget. 

Vice-President for Values and Transparency, Věra Jourová, commented: "We are on the home stretch now: we are about to launch the first-ever independent EU office to investigate and prosecute crimes affecting the EU budget. From 1 June onwards, European prosecutors, under the strong leadership of Laura Kövesi, will clamp down on criminals and make sure no euro is wasted on corruption or fraud".

Didier Reynders, European Commissioner for Justice, added: "The launch of the European Public Prosecutor's office will open up a new phase in the history of European integration. The core mission of this European body is to protect EU funds from criminals for the common interest of our citizens. It will observe the implementation of NextGenerationEU with an eagle eye, to make sure funds will be fully used to help our economies recover from the crisis".

The EPPO will investigate and prosecute the following types of fraud and other crimes affecting the EU's financial interests:

- fraud relating to expenditures and revenues;
- fraud relating to VAT (if it involves two or more Member States and is worth at least €10 million);
- money laundering of assets derived from defrauding the EU budget;
- active and passive corruption or misappropriation that affect the EU's financial interests;
- participation in a criminal organisation if the focus of its activities is to commit crimes against the EU budget.

This new EU body can also investigate and prosecute any other illegal activity that is "inextricably linked" to an offence against the EU budget.

The EPPO will conduct its investigations and prosecutions in full independence from the European Commission, other EU institutions and bodies, as well as from Member States. It will complement the work and cooperate with other EU bodies and agencies such as OLAF, Eurojust and Europol, as well as with the competent authorities of non-participating Member States. The EPPO is expected to eventually be investigating approximately 3,000 cases per year.

Headed by Laura Codruța Kövesi, the European Chief Prosecutor, the EPPO has a central office in Luxembourg, which is made up of one European Prosecutor per each participating Member State (22 at present) and other staff. European Delegated Prosecutors in the Member States form an integral part of the independent body.

Further details about the EPPO are available on the official website: www.eppo.europa.eu.