It may have taken more than a year since the scandalous visit of the president of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen to the house of Kyriakos Mitsotakis in Chania, but the conclusion of the European Ombudsman, Emily O’Reilly, is clear: The visit shows conflict of interest.
The issue has been preoccupying the European institutions since the summer of 2023, while at that time storms of reaction had arisen due to the obvious encroachment of every institutional showcase, both on the part of von der Leyen and on the part of Mitsotakis. For months, questions were asked about the matter, but finally after months of silence and excuses that it was a personal visit, MEP Sophie Id Feld submitted in January a request to investigate the case to the Ombudsman.
Then the case was opened and the investigation started, during which there was also correspondence between O’Reilly and the Commission, with the former requesting information and the latter providing it just now.
More specifically, on the relevant page of the Ombudsman it is stated: “The Ombudsman has launched an investigation and asked to examine documents that the Commission may have in its possession in relation to the request. After the Commission informed her that she had not identified documents for inspection, the Ombudsman sent preliminary findings to the Commission, outlining her view that such a visit would require prior consultations and exchanges of views within the Commission, as well as between the Commission and third parties. Based on this, the Ombudsman asked the Commission to search again for documents within the scope of the request with a view to providing the widest possible public access and urged the Commission, if no documents were found, to explain how it could for this to happen.
After considerable delay, the Commission finally issued its “affirmative decision” on the request, explaining that no documents were located due to the private and unofficial nature of the trip.
The Ombudsman expressed concern that the Commission failed to provide this explanation in the first place and instead continued to process the request. The Ombudsman was also concerned about the resulting delay, which led the Commission to significantly exceed the deadlines set out in EU law for public access to documents. He noted that the work of the Commissioners and their particular offices should be characterized by transparency and daily cooperation with the Commission services. The Ombudsman closed the case, finding that the Commission’s handling of the request, including the delay in replying that there were no documents, amounted to maladministration.”
It is noted that Sophie Id Feld has linked the visit to the country house of Kyriakos Mitsotakis of the President of the Commission with the way in which the executive power of the EU dealt with and is dealing with the policy of the Greek Prime Minister in a series of issues that is completely contrary to European values . As the MEP has mentioned, the Commission was “apparently silent” on issues such as “illegal repatriations, the investigation into the Pylos shipwreck tragedy, the scandal with the surveillance of politicians and journalists, and the undermining of independent authorities by the Greek government”. .
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