Francesco Giorgi’s request for release from prison has been postponed until January 26, according to the Brussels Federal Prosecutor’s Office
Francesco Giorgi, partner of Eva Cailiand right-hand man of Antonio Panzeri, appeared today before the pre-trial council (Chambre du Conseil), in order, as the procedure provides, to decide whether to continue his pre-trial detention for an additional month, or to release him from prison with an electronic wristband. The decision of the pre-trial council was postponed until January 26.
According to the Brussels Federal Prosecutor’s Office, Eva Kaili will appear on January 19 before the pre-trial council, which will decide whether or not to continue her pre-trial detention.
Eva Caili and her partner, Francesco Giorgi, have been in temporary detention in Belgian prisons for over a month, as part of investigations by the Belgian authorities into the corruption case from Qatar.
EP to boost Transparency
In the meantime, new proposals are being pushed by the Parliament speaker to prevent another qatargate. Green light to the draft proposals presented by President Metsola two months after the scandal. Timid openings and encouragements come from political forces, including Italian ones, but criticism rains down from experts in the field of transparency and lobbying. The cold shower from the founder of The Good Lobby: “Only minor changes to the existing ethics regime that have no structural effect.” There are no sanctions, declarations of incoming and outgoing financial interests. With Alemanno let’s try to understand why, point by point.
A ‘cooling off’ period could be envisaged for former MEPs wishing to lobby MPs. This will be linked to the transitional allowance granted to former Members. For a period in which former Members benefit from a transitional allowance they would not be allowed to be entered in the transparency register and therefore would not be able to lobby the institution they served immediately after the end of their mandate.
More and clearer information should be made available to the public. One option is to introduce an ‘Integrity’ tab on the front page of the European Parliament’s website which would centralize and contain information relating to the integrity of parliamentary work in one place. It could include detailed information on: sanctions, declarations of gifts, declarations of trips to third countries not paid for by the European Union, declarations of scheduled meetings, information on the code of conduct and the advisory board; – information and links to the Transparency Register.
