EU Greens to ask for special committee to probe Dalli tobacco scandal

European Greens have hit out at "anomalies" which emerge from John Dalli's resignation last October, and accused the European Commission of blocking what should have been a transparent matter.

"We want to simply look into the bad operations at the European Commission, what went wrong in its contacts with the tobacco industry and also in the development of its tobacco regulation," Green MEP Bart Staes said.

He added that the problem MEPs are facing "is that we are being systematically told that a criminal investigation is underway and that there thus are a certain number of elements that cannot be revealed."

Commission spokeswoman Pia Ahrenkilde, however, insisted that the EU's executive has "amply" and transparently answered all questions raised by the parliament and that it acted in conformity with World Health Organisation rules on tobacco lobbying.

Brussels had been rocked in October by Dalli's resignation, which came after EU anti-fraud investigators said he did nothing to stop an acquaintance from asking a Swedish snus company form oney to influence contentious new EU rules on tobacco products.

The case has since been handed over to the Maltese authorities, who have since prosecuted against the former PN Sliema deputy mayor and Dalli canvasser Silvio Zammit.

Tonio Borg has meanwhile been appointed to replace Dalli, and one of his first actions was to bring forward the new rules - which seek bigger health warnings on tobacco products, among other things.

Green MEPs however, argue that the lessons from the scandal have yet to be learned, pointing to reports that tobacco lobbyists held a series of meetings with a number of other European Commission officials as the new rules were being formulated.

"It is obvious that the Dalli case must have consequences for the future of lobbying in Brussels," EU parliamentarian Inge Graessle of the European People's Party, the largest political group in the legislature, recently said.

Green co-chair Rebecca Harms will ask the leaders of the parliament's other political groups to approve the creation of the special committee later today, Staes said.

"For us, as parliamentarians, we are in a situation that is clearly unacceptable," Jose Bove, another Green MEP said.