The establishment of the European Public Prosecutor’s Office

KEY POINTS

Participating countries

• The regulation establishing the EPPO under enhanced cooperation applies to the 24 participating EU Member States: Belgium, Bulgaria, Czechia, Germany, Estonia, Greece, Spain, France, Croatia, Italy, Cyprus, Latvia, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, Austria, Poland, Portugal, Romania, Slovenia, Slovakia, Finland and Sweden.
• Ireland and Hungary can join at any time. Denmark enjoys a permanent opt-out from the EU measures concerning criminal justice.

Scope

• The EPPO is an independent prosecution office of the EU with a decentralised structure. It has the power to investigate, prosecute and bring to justice (before national courts) crimes against the EU budget, such as fraud (over €10,000), corruption, money laundering, misappropriation or cross-border value added tax fraud above €10 million.
• Existing EU bodies, such as the European Anti-Fraud Office (OLAF), the European Union Agency for Criminal Justice Cooperation (Eurojust) and the European Union Agency for Law Enforcement Cooperation (Europol), lack the powers to conduct criminal investigations and prosecutions. The EPPO has established close relationships with these bodies based on mutual cooperation within their respective mandates.

Organisation

The EPPO is built on two levels.

• The central level, consisting of a central office at the seat of the EPPO in Luxembourg. The central level consists of the European Chief Prosecutor, their two deputies, the European Prosecutors (one per participating Member State) and the Administrative Director.
• The decentralised level, consisting of European Delegated Prosecutors located in the participating Member States.

Independence

• The staff of the EPPO acts in the interest of the EU as a whole and must neither ask for nor take instructions from any outside party.
• The EPPO is structurally independent from any other EU institution or service.
• The European Chief Prosecutor is selected following an open call for candidates and appointed by the European Parliament and the Council of the European Union. The term of office is limited to 7 years and is not renewable.
• The European Chief Prosecutor can be dismissed only by a decision of the Court of Justice of the European Union, following an application by the Parliament, the Council or the European Commission.
• The European Delegated prosecutors must be completely independent from national prosecution authorities.

Launch of operations

An implementing act, Implementing Decision (EU) 2021/856, set 1 June 2021 as the date on which the EPPO assumed the investigative and prosecutorial tasks conferred on it by Regulation (EU) 2017/1939.

Processing of operational personal data

A delegated act, Delegated Regulation (EU) 2020/2153, amended Regulation (EU) 2017/1939, adding an annex which sets out the categories of operational personal data and the categories of data subjects whose operational personal data may be processed in the index of case files by the EPPO.