MEP Andrea Cozzolino, who is implicated in the Brussels corruption case, has been arrested in Naples. Cozzolino made overtures to both Qatar and Morocco in the European Parliament, and he had been involved in multiple dubious cases even before this scandal.

As VNA reported, Cozzolino was arrested at the request of the Belgian prosecutor’s office by the Naples department of Guardia di Finanza, the Italian authority dealing with financial crime, as the Belgian police did not find him in his Brussels home when they conducted a house search there on Friday.

The authorities did not find Cozzolino is his Naples home either, as he had been admitted for medical tests to one of the city’s clinics, from where he was taken to prison, the Italian press reports.

The European Parliament voted to strip Andrea Cozzolino and fellow MEP Marc Tarabella of their immunity last week in response to the Belgian authorities. Tarabella was arrested on Friday.

According to a parliamentary report, Mr. Cozzolino, who until January was chairman of the European Parliament’s delegation for relations with the countries of the Maghreb region, „is suspected, together with others, of having participated in an agreement about a collaboration to protect the interests of foreign states in the European Parliament,” the Belgian public media writes. The parties in the agreement did so „in particular by preventing the adoption of parliamentary resolutions which could harm the interests of these states, in exchange for sums of money, ” the report adds.

In this vast corruption scandal of the European Parliament, the Belgian investigators seized a total of 1.5 million euros in cash, from the homes of Pier Antonio Panzeri, a former socialist MEP who is a central figure of the case, from Greek Socialist MEP Eva Kaili, and also from a suitcase carried by her father.

Information collected by the Belgian secret services reveals that Andrea Cozzolino, Antonio Panzeri and Francesco Giorgi, Eva Kaili’s private life partner, may have received money also from Abderrahim Atmoun, Morocco’s ambassador to Poland.

The text of the arrest warrant issued by Belgian judges against the MEP was reported on by the Italian news agency ANSA. According to the warrant, Cozzolino may have had „direct contact” with Atmoun and on 1 June 2022, during a meeting in Warsaw between the two, he also received „a medal of honour and a tie. Also, they allegedly discussed the guidelines to follow at the EU-Morocco joint commission of the EP.”

The Italian politician also made gestures to Qatar, which is suggested by an email he sent to the entire S&D group on the eve of the vote on the human rights resolution on the Qatar World Cup on 24 November. He wrote: „Allegedly, FIFA awarded the World Cup to Qatar due to abuses and corruption. The European Parliament cannot accuse a country without evidence.”

His lawyers told the press that the Italian politician had never received „compensation” from foreign powers.

This scandal, however, is not Cozzolino’s first dubious case.

He had earlier won an Italian primary under suspicious circumstances, which raised the possibility of vote-buying. Even the anti-mafia district directorate launched an investigation into the matter.

The primary in question was a vote to decide who would be the candidate for mayor of Naples for Cozzolino’s party, the Democratic Party (PD). The election was surprisingly won by Andrea Cozzolino with 37.3 per cent of the vote, mainly due to a large number of people voting for him in the Secondigliano and Miano districts. He finished 1,200 votes ahead of Umberto Ranieri, who was considered the favourite.

However, the result was questioned by the other mayoral candidates. It turned out that there were a number of suspicious incidents at the polling stations, with a high turnout of the Chinese community in some districts, which raised suspicions that their votes had been bought.

Moreover, Cozzolino collected an especially high number of votes in districts where the Camorra mafia organisation was active, so

after the scandalous primaries, the anti-mafia district directorate launched an investigation into suspicions of influence from the Lo Russo Camorra clan.

The primaries were finally nullified, and another politician was nominated as the party’s candidate.