Good morning,
News coming out of Brussels of yet another scandal involving alleged high-level corruption of senior officials shouldn't shock anyone.
Only the cast of characters seems to change, as well as which EU institution — after Qatargate previously threw the corruption spotlight on the European Parliament.
This time it is the former EU foreign policy chief, Federica Mogherini and Stefano Sannino, who has now reportedly retired early as the European Commission top envoy for Middle Eastern affairs, that are under the thumb.
Euractiv, which first broke the news on Tuesday, has all the details - see here and here.
But suffice it to say that it involves alleged insider knowledge on a multi-million euro tender to set up a diplomatic academy within the Bruges-based College of Europe where Mogherini is its rector.
The pilot for the academy was launched in late 2022 with a press conference by Sannino, who at the time was the secretary general of the European External Action Service (EEAS).
He had thanked Mogherini for helping set up the project "in record time" with the purpose of teaching students of "how the system works from the inside".
His words there may be a prescient warning, should any of the allegations prove true amid a probe by the EU's anti-fraud agency Olaf and the European Public Prosector Office. Sannino was arrested on Tuesday and later released.
One EU diplomat, who asked not to be named, alleged the scandal goes beyond what has so far been reported.
He said the tender to host the European Diplomatic Academy had also involved the Florence European Institute, Maastricht's European Institute of Public Administration, but also other capitals including Madrid.
"The Spanish had the best offer. The Italians screwed them over," he claimed.
With Sannino leaving the EEAS only to end up at the commission left his former colleagues stung, given the institutional rivalries. Many people in the commission are also likely happy to see the EEAS image suffer due to this latest scandal, the source said.
And that is how the EU from the inside also operates, a collection of internal disputes and territorial power egos that echoes Sannino's press statements at the launch of the academy. It also led to an investigation into fraud and his apparent early retirement. Lesson learned.
- Nikolaj Nielsen, home affairs editor
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