Questions raised by incomplete OPEKEPE file sent to EPPO

Questions person risen implicit indications that the police’s Internal Affairs Division sent lone portion of the worldly it had collected successful its probe into a increasing ungraded implicit alleged fraud related to European Union workplace subsidies to the European Public Prosecutor’s Office (EPPO).

The worldly successful question concerns wiretapped telephone conversations from 2021-2022, which revealed the engagement of a total of 20 politicians successful the OPEKEPE case, arsenic it is known successful Greece by the acronym of the state bureau liable for the organisation of the aid.

According to 1 version of events, successful the archetypal lawsuit record that constabulary sent to the Athens First Instance Prosecutor’s Office successful the autumn of 2021, astir politicians’ names were absent or, according to another, contained lone two.

Kathimerini understands that the EPPO realized the files were incomplete successful the summertime of 2023 and had to nonstop repeated requests to the constabulary to get the afloat transcript.

As stated successful an authoritative EPPO document, the Internal Affairs Service received connected July 26, 2021, an anonymous ailment detailing fraud within OPEKEPE and against the interests of the European Union, which allegedly progressive employees of the enactment arsenic well arsenic section farmers. A fewer weeks later, a 2nd anonymous ailment was sent with further details astir the aforesaid case.

Based connected the two complaints, Internal Affairs tapped the phones of 16 suspects, chiefly executives of OPEKEPE, including the then president of the organization, Dimitris Melas. Mellas is included successful astir telephone conversations with the politicians mentioned successful the caller EPPO record that was precocious sent to Parliament.

The grounds collected was submitted to the Athens First Instance Prosecutor’s Office successful October 2022. Four months later, successful February 2023, it sent the record to the EPPO. According to sources, the record contained the two anonymous complaints and portion of the recorded telephone conversations, which acrophobic 5 OPEKEPE employees. There were very constricted references to the imaginable engagement of governmental figures, sources said.

In the summertime of 2023, the EPPO sent the Internal Affairs part a caller bid requesting a amended and much implicit processing of the evidence. The caller record was resubmitted successful the autumn of the aforesaid year and contained, for the archetypal time, the names of two politicians (of the 20 that were yet named).

The EPPO made yet different petition for the afloat transcript from the wiretaps dating from the summertime of 2021 to the summertime of 2022. The process was completed successful 2025 and the further grounds was submitted to the Organized Crime Division to tally checks connected the finances of the radical mentioned successful the transcribed conversations.

The last constabulary study was forwarded to the European authoritative conscionable a fewer days ago. The EPPO moved rapidly to signifier lawsuit files for the grounds dating to 2021 to forestall misdemeanors from becoming statute-barred. The wiretaps for the play from the start of '22 to the summertime of the aforesaid year will signifier the ground for caller lawsuit files successful the adjacent future.