EU Funds disappear

From Little Green Footballs comes the link to a story in This London Newspaper: bq. A TEAM of inspectors from OLAF, the European Union fraud office, is this week arriving in Jerusalem to investigate whether EU funds have been misdirected by the Palestinians. bq. The European fraud-busters come at a time when allegations are mounting of corruption in the Palestinian Authority. bq. Palestinian officials and employees of pressure groups in the West Bank and Gaza are accused of having systematically diverted foreign aid over recent years. bq. But the outcome of the OLAF investigation is by no means certain. bq. That's because European Union officials, orchestrated by EU External Relations Commissioner Chris Patten, have repeatedly ignored the signs that millions of euros of taxpayers' money may be ending up in the wrong Palestinian pockets. bq. In the hope of strengthening ties with Yasser Arafat and the Arab world, EU leaders have proved remarkably reluctant to find out exactly how their aid money is spent. And more: bq. The EU has placed customs tariffs on Israeli goods produced in West Bank settlements. EU aid to Israel is not allowed to be used in the occupied territories. The time may have come for the EU to apply similar sanctions to the Palestinians. bq. Yasser Arafat is suspected of having been paying the salaries of terrorists from the e10m in monthly EU budget support for his civil service. bq. Patten's claims that the EU funds were minutely supervised by the IMF have been disputed by the IMF official responsible, Salaam Fayyad, now Palestinian finance minister. bq. An IMF report concluded that $900m was 'diverted' from the PA budget up to 2000. And more: bq. Former Palestinian cabinet minister Abdel Fattah Hamayel admits paying $40,000 per month 'living expenses' to those Al-Aqsa Martyrs' Brigades gunmen not already employed by the Palestinian security forces. And more: bq. LAST week, lawyer Khader Shekirat was arrested by Palestinian police after the EU accused him of stealing $2m from LAW - the EU-funded Palestinian human rights group which he headed. And more: bq. Recently, the Palestinian NGO Network flatly refused to sign a pledge, requested by the American aid body USAID, that they will not 'provide material support or resources to any individual or entity that advocates, plans, sponsors, engages in or has engaged in terrorist activity'. And finally, a voice of reason: bq. The EU should consider a similar pledge - combined with concrete action - from the Palestinian NGOs and the Palestinian Authority government.