Еуропалық комиссиядағы сыбайлас жемқорлыққа қарсы күрескен голланд саяхатшысы Пол ван Буйтенен

Dutch politician

Paul van Buitenen (; born 28 May 1957) is a retired Dutch politician of the Europe Transparent Party who served as a Member of the European Parliament from 2004 to 2009. He was an assistant auditor in the European Commission's Financial Control Directorate becoming the whistleblower who first drew the attention of a Member of the European Parliament to the irregularities, fraud and mismanagement within the Commission in 1998. In May 2005, he also asked the European Commission to create an investigation, after learning that Frits Bolkestein (author of the Directive on services in the internal market) was a member of the Russian Bank Menatep's international consultative council (owned by Mikhail Khodorkovsky) and that he had worked for the Shell British Dutch petrol company, two firms "detaining secret accounts in Clearstream".

On 26 April 2006, daily 20 Minutes revealed that "in May 2005, MEP Paul van Buitenen was shocked by Frits Bolkestein's presence to Menatep's international consultative council, a sulfurous Russian banking establishment, and by his work for Shell, British Dutch petrol company. Two firms 'detaining secret accounts in Clearstream' van Buitenen, also Dutch, then asked for 'clarification' to the European Commission and the opening of a parliamentary investigation. The Commission's president, José Manuel Barroso, answered that these facts "don't bring up any new question" and that it is not known "if Menatep took contact with Bolkestein while he was in his functions". No investigation thereby took place." The free daily underlines that "in 2001, it was Bolkestein himself that announced the Commission's refusal to open up a parliamentary investigation on Clearstream", following Harlem Désir's requests and accusations that Menatep had an "undeclared account" at Clearstream. Bolkestein refused to answer any questions by the newspaper.

On 5 March 2008, Paul van Buitenen published on his website a summary of a confidential internal report dealing with abuse of the EU expenses and staff allowance system.

"The European Anti Fraud Office (OLAF) has had success in combating external corruption in the member states, but it is in the internal cases where it has found problems. Working with the EU authorities makes it very difficult to proceed in an investigation OLAF's independence exists only on paper Every time the committee is approached about corruption, it promises to improve the situation. But then a new case arises We must decide if we are to continue with the European arrangement. If we do, then we must also create these democratic structures at European level. Otherwise we should revert to allowing the national authorities and parliaments to take over the controlling functions again. But at the moment, as it stands, everything goes wrong Things have got even worse. There is now a regulation which supposedly protects so called whistleblowers which makes officials believe that they can uncover scandals. But in reality, if one does this, they are destroyed. So the regulation does not work. "(Deutsche Welle, 2 April 2007)

Andreas Oldag, Hans Martin Tillack: Raumschiff Brüssel – Wie die Demokratie in Europa scheitert (in German, Spaceship Brussels – How Democracy in Europe fails), Argon Verlag, 2003 (1st ed., hardcover), , / Fischer, Frankfurt 2004 (2nd ed.) ,