Former Vice-President of the European Parliament Eva Kaili – one of the key figures implicated in the Qatargate corruption scandal – will resume her parliamentary duties next week, Belga News Agency reports.
The news follows the 44-year-old Greek MEP’s release from house arrest on Thursday, where she had remained since mid-April.
“Next week, she will be in the European Parliament to carry out her duties,” Kaili’s lawyer, Michalis Dimitrakopoulos, told the Greek television channel Skai on Friday.
Dimitrakopoulos also noted that his client will ask Parliament to determine whether her arrest and subsequent incarceration violated her rights as an MEP. He added that Kaili “thinks she will be acquitted… if the case goes to trial.”
Nothing out of the ordinary?
Kaili was arrested on 9 December last year on suspicion of accepting bribes and other favours from the Qatari and Moroccan Governments in exchange for her support for pro-Qatari and pro-Moroccan legislation. She denies any involvement in the scandal.
Upon her arrest, federal investigators discovered €150,000 in cash at Kaili’s Brussels apartment. A further €600,000 was found in a suitcase carried by Kaili’s father as he was leaving a luxury hotel in downtown Brussels.
Following the revelations, Kaili was stripped of her position as Vice-President and expelled from her centre-left parliamentary group, the Progressive Alliance of Socialists and Democrats (S&D).
Kaili’s partner, Francesco Giorgi, with whom Kaili has a young child, has already confessed to accepting bribes, although he denies that Kaili is guilty of any wrongdoing.
In addition to his links to Kaili, Giorgi is a close associate of two other key figures implicated in the scandal. At the time of his arrest with Kaili on 9 December, Giorgi was working as a parliamentary assistant to Italian MEP Andrea Cozzolino (S&D), who has since been placed under house arrest in Italy.
Giorgi also previously worked as an advisor to Italian former MEP Pier Antonio Panzeri (S&D) who, like Giorgi, has already confessed to accepting bribes.
During his interview on Greek TV, Dimitrakopoulos claimed that Panzeri was the “mastermind” behind the corruption scheme and that Kaili’s fingerprints had not been found on any money seized by the Belgian authorities.
Source: Brussels Times
