EU Commission quizzed over OLAF’s relationship with tobacco industry

The European Commission has been asked how it can guarantee that co-operation between the European Anti-Fraud Office (OLAF) and the tobacco industry won’t lead to a reduction in tobacco-industry vigilance by OLAF.

In a preamble to his question, Marc Tarabella, a Belgian politician and member of the European Parliament, said that since 2004 the Commission had, via OLAF, concluded agreements with the four biggest tobacco-products manufacturers in order to combat the smuggling and counterfeiting of cigarettes.

OLAF used information provided by the tobacco industry, while the multi-national corporations were financing the work of the investigators by contributing €2 billion, up to 2029, to the EU’s budget.

‘As part of this collaboration, customs agents were sent into the company Japan Tobacco International (JTI) for training,’ Tarabella said. ‘At the same time, the company JTI was involved in an investigation into contraband cigarettes conducted by the OLAF in 2011. In other words, the investigator is trained by the persons it must investigate.

‘How can the Commission guarantee that this collaboration with the tobacco industry will not result in a conflict of interests for the OLAF and, subsequently, in a reduction of vigilance with regard to the tobacco industry?’

Tarabella’s question is due to be answered by the Commission in writing.

Meanwhile, in another intervention on the question of the tobacco industry’s contributions to the EU’s budget, Tarabella said that exactly what this money was buying manufacturers, which had been dubbed ‘reasonable expectations’, remained classified.

However, he said that the World Health Organization’s Framework Convention on Tobacco Control, which had been ratified by the EU, obliged signatories to protect tobacco control policies from the influence of the tobacco industry.

He then went on to pose two questions:

* ‘How is the European Commission able to demonstrate that the money paid by the tobacco industry and whatever the industry is receiving in exchange do not contravene this principle?

* ‘Does the Commission intend to renegotiate a contract with PMI once the current contract expires in 2016?’