Malta and 13 other EU member states were upbraided by the European Commission for having so far failed to implement EU confiscation rules to be used against criminal organisations and which were meant to come into force two years ago.
The Commission said the failure was allowing criminals to use the member states in question to launder money through property and trade in stolen luxury cars.
“In a time of economic crisis, it is unfortunate that some EU member states are letting billions of euros’ worth of convicted criminals’ assets slip through the net. This happens even though governments agreed on confiscation measures four years ago,” said Commission Vice-President Viviane Reding, who is responsible for justice, fundamental rights and citizenship.
She said the unwillingness of many member states to comply with Council framework decisions made it clear why the EU’s area of justice needed the Lisbon Treaty.
“In future, we must have clearer rules, more consistent application and enforcement and, above all, trust between justice systems,” she said. “In the meantime, I call on member states to put the anti-crime rules in place so that the justice authorities can work together and effectively attack criminals’ ill-gotten gains.”
Under the rules, one EU country can send a confiscation order to another country where the subject of the order lives or has property or income.
The other country directly carries out the confiscation, under its own national rules, without any further formality.
A report just published by the Commission indicates that Malta has not yet notified Brussels of the transposition of the Council framework decision, which was agreed in 2006 and had to be implemented by November 2008. While six member states have informed Brussels that work on the implementation of the law “is in progress”, Malta has not briefed the Commission on the state of play.
In this regard, Malta was put in same boat as Bulgaria, Estonia, Luxembourg, Slovakia, Sweden and the UK. The countries that have so far implemented the new rules are Austria, the Czech Republic, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Hungary, Ireland, Latvia, The Netherlands, Poland, Portugal, Romania and Slovenia.
A spokesman for the Ministry of Justice and Home Affairs said the rules had been drafted and were expected to be published through a legal notice in October.
The rules list limited circumstances in which member states may refuse to carry out confiscation orders, such as violation of double jeopardy (being tried twice for the same crime).
The Commission report shows that all but three countries (Ireland, Portugal and The Netherlands) have added further reasons for refusing to carry out other countries’ confiscation orders. According to the Commission, this limits the impact of an instrument intended to allow the authorities to immediately recognise each other’s decisions.