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One of the main suspects in the corruption probe surrounding the European parliament and alleged interference from countries including Morocco and Qatar has filed fresh complaints on the conduct of Belgian investigators, asking for the entire case to be thrown out.
The complaint by Francesco Giorgi includes a secret recording of a conversation with a senior police officer involved in the case, who paid him a visit at home last year and complained about prosecutors and judges in Belgium serving a political agenda. The main suspects in the so-called Qatargate case last year had already requested an inquiry into the Belgian probe, which has delayed the case going to trial.
Giorgi’s lawyers on Monday submitted the 18-minute recording to the federal prosecutor’s office calling into question “the regularity” of the investigation, according to a copy of the letter accompanying the files seen by the Financial Times.
Lawyer Pierre Monville said he was sharing the recording with all the other parties involved in the case “so everyone could draw their own conclusions”, according to the letter.
Chief police inspector Ceferino Alvarez-Rodriguez stopped by Giorgi’s apartment on May 3 2023 to return a phone that had previously been seized by the police. The conversation was recorded by Giorgi without the police investigator’s knowledge.
Giorgi had been released from jail three months earlier and was required to wear an electronic bracelet, after being arrested in December 2022 when police found hundreds of thousands of euros in cash at his and his partner’s home.
The Italian national had been a longtime parliamentary assistant to the alleged kingpin of the scheme, former MEP Pier Antonio Panzeri, who was also arrested in December, with police seizing a total of €1.5mn in cash. Panzeri struck a plea deal with Belgian investigators last year, following the arrest of his wife and daughter. He admitted receiving money from foreign governments to influence EU legislation in return for a reduced sentence — a deal that has yet to be approved by a Belgian court.
According to the recording cited in the legal letter and listened to by the FT, Alvarez-Rodriguez claims that Belgian authorities believed that Panzeri was lying at the time he struck his plea deal.
“We know that [Panzeri is lying] and we will do what is necessary so that the [plea bargain] will not pass,” Alvarez-Rodriguez says. “If we prove he is lying . . . he is over.”
The recording shows Giorgi was furious because investigators had searched his apartment after his release from jail and seized notes he had written for his legal defence.
In response to Giorgi calling Belgian investigative methods “shocking” and saying he does not trust the judiciary, Alvarez-Rodriguez says: “You must be crazy to trust the judiciary today, whatever country, whatever judiciary.”
“I will trust the judiciary the day judges and prosecutors are not politically appointed, OK? I have no trust in the judiciary because its strings are pulled by politicians.”
Judges and prosecutors in Belgium are selected by an independent judiciary council and then appointed by the justice minister.
The investigative judge on the case, who was approving arrest warrants and overseeing the probe, Michel Claise, stepped aside in June 2023 after it was revealed that his son was in business with the son of another MEP linked to Panzeri.
At the time, the prosecutor’s office said Claise was stepping down “as a matter of caution and in order to allow justice to continue its work calmly and to maintain the necessary separation between private and family life and professional responsibilities”.
The prosecutor’s office on Monday said it took note of the remarks attributed to a police officer and recorded without his knowledge. It said that its investigative work focuses precisely on “verifying the veracity of statements” made by the person who struck a plea deal and whether all the legal requirements were met for that agreement to be approved.
“A procedure is currently under way in front of an independent court to scrutinise the legality of several investigative actions,” the office added.
The federal police declined to comment.
Additional reporting by Laura Dubois in Brussels
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