Kritiek van Britse conservatieven op uitstel EP-hoorzitting EU-fraudebureau OLAF (en)

EUOBSERVER / BRUSSELS - European Parliament chiefs are facing criticism from British Conservative MEP and petitions committee rapporteur Sir Robert Atkins over a decision to cancel a 14 July hearing on the European Commission's anti-fraud body, OLAF.

The heads of the leading political factions took the decision at a meeting on Thursday morning (7 July), prompting Mr Atkins to fire off a letter of complaint to parliament president Josep Borrell on Friday.

"To cancel the hearing on this day will be seen, at the least, as an attempt to defer discussing difficult issues, and, at worst, as some sort of cover up", the letter states, urging Mr Borrell to recall MEPs' leaders and retable the debate "immediately".

The 14 July meeting was due to pit the outgoing head of OLAF, Franz Bruner, against the EU ombudsman, Nikiforos Diamandouros i, in a clash over allegations that the anti-fraud office misled the ombudsman in a case involving German reporter Hans-Martin Tillack.

The petitions committee's civil servants had already drafted a preliminary resolution slating OLAF for misleading Mr Diamandouros and for publishing "tendencious and misleading information on its website" concerning Mr Tillack.

The as-yet unofficial report also calls for a "mechanism for effective control over OLAF to ensure that human rights and fundamental freedoms are respected".

Sir Atkins told EUobserver that the details of Mr Tillack's case do not concern him so much as the "very serious allegation" that OLAF has been misled.

Nothing in it, says Priestley

But parliament civil service chief Julian Priestley said the decision to postpone the 14 July hearing was related to agenda problems arising out of the London terrorist attacks on Thursday morning.

He explained that the OLAF resolution was one of eight separate requests for own-initiative reports that "would have given rise to some debate", but that the meeting was cut short by president Borrell's decision to speak to plenary about events in London instead.

"The matter was dealt with globally and collectively", he indicated. "It was not a value-judgment of the conference of presidents on the specific reports that were being presented".

He added that the OLAF subject will come back onto the parliament's agenda in early September after the summer recess.

Socialist group spokesman Tony Robinson said that OLAF was number 13 on the meeting's agenda and that "the postponement was linked with own-initiative reports, which have to be approved before any hearings can take place".

He added that "it would have been dealt with if not for the tragic events in London" and that "it would be absolutely untrue to suggest that there is any kind of cover-up in this".

OLAF washed its hands of the matter saying it had no knowledge of the "parliamentary affair" and pointing out that the European Court of Auditors has tabled its own hearing for Mr Bruner on 12-13 July next week.