Reporter following trail of corruption in EU arrested
Police arrested a leading investigative journalist yesterday on the orders of the European Union, seizing his computers, address books and archive of files in a move that stunned Euro-MPs
stunned, huh? Guess they donât read Rantburg
Hans-Martin Tillack, the Brussels correspondent for Germanyâs Stern magazine, said he was held for 10 hours without access to a lawyer by the Belgian police after his office and home were raided by six officers.
on what basis?
"They asked me to tell them who my sources were. I replied that was something I would never do. Now they have all my sensitive files, so I suppose theyâll find out anyway," he said last night. "The police said I was lucky I wasnât in Burma or central Africa, where journalists get the real treatment," he added.
nice....Euro thugs. Trained in Bobland?
Mr Tillack said the raid was triggered by a complaint from the EUâs anti-fraud office, OLAF. He was accused of paying money to obtain a leaked OLAF dossier two years ago, which he denies. The European Ombudsman has already come to his defence, issuing a harsh criticism of OLAFâs campaign to silence him.
Harsh criticism! That's the ticket, by golly! | Mr Tillack, who describes himself as a "pro-European federalist", has been OLAFâs most vocal critic, accusing it of covering up abuses within the EU system. As the author of a recent book on EU corruption, he has the greatest archive of investigative files of any journalist working in Brussels.
make that "had the greatest archive..."
OLAF was created to replace the old fraud office UCLAF, which was accused of covering up abuses by the disgraced Santer Commission. Many UCLAF staff were transferred to OLAF.
Posted by: Frank G 2004-03-21 |