Greens appoint their members on EP Panama Papers probe committee

Green MEPs have appointed their representatives on an inquiry committee of the European Parliament which will be investigating Panama Papers, the leak from Panamanian firm Mossack Fonseca that revealed massive international tax evasion.

The setting up of the inquiry committee was unanimously backed by the European Parliament Conference of Presidents, which unites the EP president and political group leaders.

Malta’s minister within the Office of the Prime Minister, Konrad Mizzi, can be expected to testify before the committee after MEPs said they would “definitely” want to grill the former energy minister.

“We will be coordinating closely with our Green colleagues in the EP. It is good to emphasise that our priorities will be not only to establish political responsibilities, but also to establish what roles so called ‘intermediaries’ have had in helping to dodge taxes,” AD chairperson Arnold Cassola said.

The 65-member parliamentary committee will include four Greens/EFA MEPs, who were confirmed by the group yesterday evening: Pascal Durand, Sven

Giegold, Eva Joly and Molly Scott Cato.

The Greens/EFA group will also have four substitute members: Heidi

Hautala, Ernest Maragall, Michel Reimon and Ernest Urtasun.

The other political groups will decide on their representatives over the coming week and the European Parliament plenary will vote to confirm the constitution of the committee at its plenary session on 23

June.

The committee will then hold its initial constitutive meeting, hopefully in July, Cassola said.

The four priorities headlined by the Green MEPs are to establish whether banks and other financial institutions failed to meet their obligations to fight tax evasion and money laundering and establishing the exact role of intermediaries in helping individuals and companies to dodge taxes or launder dirty money.

The MEPs want political responsibility to be clarified, both as regards those

European politicians named in the papers and the role of national authorities and the Commission in allowing this to occur.

The Greens will also push for the completion of the original investigation set up by the EP into the Luxembourg Leaks revelations, which will be facilitated by the inquiry committee's structure.