Top EU fraud cop: Want to go after Russia sanctions evaders, billions in tax cheating

The European Union’s (EU) chief prosecutor, who forged a reputation cracking down on corrupt politicians in her native Romania, says she’s itching to get to work tackling Russian sanctions evaders.

The European Public Prosecutor’s Office, operational for just over a year now, is well-equipped to take on sanctions busting as the bloc pushes ahead with plans to make it a criminal offense under EU law and give her office the power to prosecute it as soon as possible, said Laura Codruta Kovesi.

“We’re certainly ready, we can do it,” Kovesi, 49, said in an online interview from her office in Luxembourg on Friday. “One of the possible crimes connected to the breach of sanctions is smuggling and we can already investigate that,” she explained. “So we could start as early as today if we had the legal instruments.”

The bloc has so far frozen about €18.9 billion of assets belonging to sanctioned Russian individuals and entities since Vladimir Putin’s February invasion of Ukraine.

Sanctions violations aside, Kovesi already has her hands full. The EPPO’S is already investigating more than $5.3 bn worth of cases of suspected Budget fraud.

Kovesi was the first top-level EU official to visit Ukraine since the Russian invasion and signed an agreement with the authorities there to share information on suspected cases of fraud in Ukraine connected to Eu-linked funds.

“We have a pretty solid contact with the Ukrainian general prosecutor’s office and looking forward to the potential new competency for the EPPO” to work more closely with colleagues in Kyiv, said Kovesi.