A policeman stands guard outside Mossack Fonseca headquarters at Panama City | Ed Grimaldo/AFP via Getty Images
European Parliament puts off decision on Panama Papers probe
Three-week delay while legal questions are sorted out.
STRASBOURG — The European Parliament is set to delay a decision on setting up a committee to investigate issues related to the Panama Papers leaks, after the assembly’s legal service raised questions Wednesday night about how the panel would work.
The Parliament’s political group leaders had expected at a meeting on Thursday to approve a request to create a committee of inquiry on whether EU law was properly applied in relation to money laundering, tax avoidance, and tax evasion allegations raised by the Panama Papers.
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According to the draft of the proposal to create the committee of inquiry, a copy of which was obtained by POLITICO, the Parliament wants to probe the European Commission and EU countries for “maladministration,” failure to enforce tax law, and “potential regulatory gaps and shortcomings.”
But the presidents of the assembly’s political groups decided to delay the vote for three weeks following last-minute recommendations from the legal services department.
The groups agreed to postpone the decision “so that they can revise the mandate alongside the legal services,” said a spokesperson for the European Conservatives and Reformists party.
A spokesperson for European Parliament President Martin Schulz confirmed that the political groups could not agree on a common text before the meeting.
“The European Parliament estimates that tax evasion and avoidance costs the European Union between €50 and €70 billion a year while estimations for money laundering activities’ costs vary but put the numbers on a huge scale,” the draft proposal states.