"Italian prosecutors have opened a money-laundering investigation related to the European parliament ‘Qatargate’ affair, as a new front opens up in the biggest scandal to hit EU institutions for decades. Milan’s prosecutor’s office is probing two unnamed suspects connected to Pier Antonio Panzeri, the self-styled kingpin at the heart of the corruption scandal surrounding the European parliament where he was chair of the human rights committee. While Belgian authorities have charged Panzeri in a case involving payments from Qatar and Morocco, the new probe is the first time Italian authorities have opened a related investigation in what was widely seen as the EU’s biggest scandal since corruption allegations helped bring down European Commission president Jacques Santer in the 1990s."
Financial Times
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