Juncker at the center of a corruption scandal: Brussels understands Čović and Dodik well

By Haris Ljevo

President of the European Commission Jean-Claude Juncker found himself at the center of a scandal after the British Daily Mail published that this high-ranking European official used private planes for half of his official trips in 2018.

According to European Commission rules, chartering planes is only allowed when a suitable commercial flight cannot be found. The British newspaper, citing official EU data, states that Juncker used a private plane for 21 out of 43 official trips between January and November 2018.

Juncker, according to the Mail's report, incurred costs of several hundred thousand euros. The most expensive private jet trip per person was Juncker's one-day visit to Madrid, which cost €7,483. The second most expensive trip, costing over €7,000, was a four-day visit to the Western Balkans between February 25 and March 1, during which Juncker also visited BiH.

Following this revelation, EU investigative bodies have been called upon to launch an investigation against Juncker for using private planes paid for by EU taxpayers.

This is not the first time the head of the European Commission has been at the center of a scandal. In November 2014, just ten days after taking office as President of the EC, Juncker came under fire from European media and MEPs. European media at the time published secret documents showing that Juncker, during his 19 years as Prime Minister of Luxembourg, had developed an entire industry that helped companies evade taxes.

A group of international investigative journalists at the time published hundreds of documents proving how nearly 350 major global companies such as Ikea, Pepsi, Procter & Gamble, Heinz, JP Morgan, FedEx, Amazon, Deutsche Bank, and others made arrangements with the Luxembourg authorities during Juncker's premiership. The documents prove that these companies established subsidiaries in that country, and then, through internal lending within the companies, managed to avoid paying taxes in their headquarters.

The loudest outcry against the EU leaders came during negotiations with EU officials and Greek authorities led by Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras and then-Minister of Finance Yanis Varoufakis. Varoufakis openly claimed that leading European banks, primarily those from Germany and France, were actually profiting under the guise of financial aid to the struggling Greek economy, while the debts of Greece would be paid by the poorest citizens of Greece for years to come. Varoufakis resigned due to the inability to reach a fair agreement for Greece and claims today that the administrative center of the EU in Brussels is nothing more than a group of corrupt bureaucrats.

Zijad Bećirović, Director of the International Institute for Middle Eastern and Balkan Studies (IFIMES) from Ljubljana, recently made several criticisms of the EU and its representatives in BiH during a guest appearance on N1 television regarding the conditioning of BiH on its European path. Bećirović also reminded of the corruption among EU officials and pointed out that some countries became EU members through a shortened procedure, while others are required to fulfill all conditions.

“So far, the EU has not contributed much to the stabilization of the situation in BiH or to BiH's European path through its conditioning, because it constantly invents and sets new conditions under which BiH should become an EU member. It is not good to change the rules of the game when the game is already underway, just as the Election Law of BiH could not be changed when the elections had already been called,” Bećirović told N1.

He pointed out that some countries were admitted to the EU even though they were in a worse situation at the time of admission than BiH is now.

“I remind you, with all due respect to Bulgaria and Romania, we know how these countries became EU members. It was prioritized, allies across the Atlantic insisted through the European People's Party (EPP) to vote for Bulgaria and Romania's membership in the EU, and in many aspects, regardless of its position, BiH is in better shape than Bulgaria and Romania were,” stated Bećirović. 

Bećirović particularly highlighted the role of the Head of the EU Delegation in BiH, Lars-Gunnar Wigemark, who has also been accused by some domestic politicians of sending fabricated reports about our country to Brussels.

“The EU is doing a great injustice to BiH, and we see what the EU ambassadors in BiH are doing, including Ambassador Wigemark. They are in cahoots with the political and criminal elites in BiH, they send special reports about BiH to the EU. We must know what happened behind the scenes when the Excise Law was adopted, how Wigemark celebrated it with Milorad Dodik. These are strong ties between political leaders in BiH and EU representatives, and much of the crime in BiH is not only a consequence of domestic criminal structures but is imported crime that seeks the closest forms of cooperation, and this crime has found partners even among some high-ranking EU officials, both in BiH and, of course, in the EU institutions in Brussels itself. This is very worrying for BiH and the region,” Bećirović believes. 

The Director of IFIMES warned about the work of the EU Delegation in Sarajevo. 

“The election campaign for the European Parliament elections begins in a few months, and I expect OLAF (European Anti-Fraud Office) to investigate the activities of the EU in the Western Balkan region, the heads of EU Delegations, because it is common knowledge that the EU Delegation in Sarajevo has some blacklists of undesirable individuals and organizations, how funds are allocated, it involves huge sums of money, which indicates criminal activities, this is about the EU, not BiH, so we must be strict, not only towards domestic structures but also towards EU institutions, because this crime is not new, as it involves a criminalized bureaucratic structure, and most importantly, huge money is circulating there, so it is simply a paradise for such illegal activities,” concluded Zijad Bećirović. 

All these affairs of Jean-Claude Juncker, Varoufakis' accusations against European officials, and Zijad Bećirović's statements, only show that Brussels leaders are not immune to corruption.

The yielding of European leaders to the demands and ultimatums of Milorad Dodik and Dragan Čović, who are doing everything to stop BiH's European path, shows that Varoufakis and Bećirović are largely correct in what they say.