Fighting Terrorism through the European Public Prosecutor’s Office (EPPO)? : What future for the EPPO in the EU’s Criminal Policy?

Abstract

The EPPO was established by Regulation 2017/1939, which entered into force on 20 November 2017, under enhanced cooperation to fight crimes affecting the Union budget. The Office is currently in the set-up phase with the aim of becoming operational at the end of 2020. On 12 September 2018, the Commission published a Communication on the extension of the EPPO’s competences to cross-border terrorist crimes and invited the European Council to take this initiative forward at the informal summit in Sibiu on 9 May 2019. As a single, decentralised European prosecution office, the EPPO could become an effective tool in investigating, prosecuting and bringing to judgement terrorist crimes and add a European dimension to the current efforts. Compared to the present horizontal, multinational approach, the EPPO would create a vertical, European relationship amongst the Member States and Union actors. This could be a decisive qualitative improvement, which would help overcoming the divergences of effective investigation and prosecution of terrorist crimes across the EU. This article outlines the key aspects of the Communication, touches upon the procedural/legal steps needed for an extension of the EPPO’s competences, and discusses the potential legal and practical implications of such an extension. It sets out which aspects demand particular attention prior to a decision on an extension of the competences of the EPPO, thereby stressing that justice and security are inextricably linked and have to be looked at together. The authors point out that a narrower and more targeted approach, such as a gradual extension of the EPPO’s competences to financial crimes, organised crime or cybercrime could also be envisaged, while at a later stage other types of crimes, such as trafficking in human beings, trafficking in arms and eventually cross-border terrorist crimes, could be included.