EPPO prosecutors oath taking. [ Ссылка ] Today, the European Prosecutors of the new European Public Prosecutor's Office have taken their oath in a ceremony at the European Court of Justice. Věra Jourová, Vice-President for Transparency and Values, Johannes Hahn, Commissioner for Budget and Administration and Didier Reynders, Commissioner for Justice and Consumers, made the following statement:

“We welcome and congratulate the new European Prosecutors, who today have taken their solemn oath to do their crucial work for the European Union in combatting fraud and corruption.

Their mission is clear: to fight financial crime and protect the EU taxpayer's money.

Criminals know no borders. It is time prosecutors do not either. The European Public Prosecutor's Office will be a game changer in fighting cross-border financial crimes.

The Office will complement the important work of Eurojust and OLAF, creating a unified European approach to fighting crimes that affect the Union's financial interests.

The European Prosecutors have a crucial job to do: they need to bring justice into an area where impunity is frequent and losses are significant for both the EU and national budgets. For this, they must be independent, determined and thorough in their investigations.

We are glad that, despite the challenges of the pandemic, together we still managed to achieve our goal of setting up the new office this year.”

The new European Public Prosecutor's Office (EPPO) will be the first supranational public prosecution office, operating across all EU countries participating in the enhanced cooperation and will combine European and national law enforcement efforts in a unified, seamless and efficient approach. It will investigate and prosecute fraud and other crimes affecting the EU's financial interests (so-called ‘PIF' offences as defined in Directive (EU) 2017/1371).

The EPPO will operate as a single office headed by a European Chief Prosecutor working with one European Prosecutor from each participating EU Member State. At least two European Delegated Prosecutors will operate in the judicial system of each participating Member State and work closely with the central office, located in Luxembourg.

The EPPO has been set up because every year billions of euro are lost in revenue because of fraud, including cross-border VAT fraud. This is no petty crime: criminals, including those practising transnational organised crime, are profiting enormously every year by evading criminal prosecution, which in turn fuels corruption and undermines the rule of law.

European Public Prosecutor's Office
The EPPO is an independent Union body competent to fight crimes against the Union budget.

The European Public Prosecutor’s Office will be an independent and decentralised prosecution office of the European Union, with the competence to investigate, prosecute and bring to judgment crimes against the EU budget, such as fraud, corruption or serious cross-border VAT fraud. The Regulation establishing the European Public Prosecutor’s Office under enhanced cooperation was adopted on 12 October 2017 and entered into force on 20 November 2017. At this stage, there are 22 participating EU countries.

Currently, only national authorities can investigate and prosecute fraud against the EU budget. But their powers stop at national borders. Existing EU-bodies such as Eurojust, Europol and the EU's anti-fraud office (OLAF) lack the necessary powers to carry out criminal investigations and prosecutions.

The European Public Prosecutor’s Office is currently being set up, with the aim of becoming operational at the end of 2020. The European Public Prosecutor’s Office will have its seat in Luxembourg.

The European Public Prosecutor’s Office will operate as a single office across all participating EU countries and will combine European and national law enforcement efforts in a unified, seamless and efficient approach. The European Public Prosecutor’s Office will be built on two levels: the central and the national level. The central level will consist of the European Chief Prosecutor, its two Deputies, 22 European Prosecutors (one per participating EU country), two of whom as Deputies for the European Chief Prosecutor and the Administrative Director. The decentralised level will consist of European Delegated Prosecutors who will be located in the participating EU countries. The central level will supervise the investigations and prosecutions carried out at the national level. As a rule, it will be the European Delegated Prosecutors who will carry out the investigation and prosecution in their EU country.

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