Ex-tourism chief found guilty of fraud

Date: 28/09/00

By John Shelley

A FORMER official of the European Commission has been sentenced to four years in prison in Paris for defrauding the EU's tourism budget.

Greek George Tzoanos, head of the Commission's tourism unit between 1989 and 1995, was found guilty of awarding contracts worth €1.87 million to companies to carry out tourism projects and then taking nearly €230,000 in kickbacks. Tzoanos, 57, was sentenced in his absence and is currently on the run.

His assistant, Pascal Châtillon who was employed in the Commission on a temporary basis, was also found guilty in connection with the fraud and was given a two-year suspended sentence. Substantial fines were also imposed on both men.

Three other men who plotted to set up false companies for the purpose of receiving the money were given suspended sentences of between two and three years.

A Commission spokesman welcomed the verdicts, saying the case was the result of complaints the institution made to the French police. "It proves the fact that the Commission is willing to do what many people have been tempted to say we are not in the past. We take action whenever we can against fraud," he added.

But British Conservative MEP Edward McMillan-Scott, who first alerted the authorities to the problem, claims the Commission only contacted the police when it was forced to because of the publicity. "The reality is that there has been pressure from the Commission not to do anything about this," he said.

Because of the international nature of the crimes the EU executive has also lodged complaints with authorities in Belgium, Greece and Spain.

McMillan-Scott says the French court's verdicts must put further pressure on the Belgian authorities to act "because these crimes and others still under investigation were run from the European Commission in Brussels".

A former official of the European Commission has been sentenced to four years in prison in Paris for defrauding the EU's tourism budget. George Tzoanos was head of the Commission's tourism unit between 1989 and 1995.