Archive

BY KEITH NUTHALL
EUROPEAN Union (EU) ministers have formally approved the creation of an EU Solidarity Fund, helping Member States deal quickly with the effects of natural and man-made disasters; its funds will be mobilised immediately to assist regions affected by the floods of August and September 2002.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
REGULATORY controls have been proposed by the European Commission to prevent discounted AIDS, malaria and TB medicines supplied to developing countries under emergency medical programmes from being re-exported fraudulently into the European Union (EU). Brussels is worried that existing laws might be insufficient “after strongly discounted pharmaceuticals are sold to the poorest developing country markets (when) the economic interest in trade diversion into high priced markets therefore may increase significantly.”…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
IMAGINATIVE fraudsters have issued a fake insurance policy in the name of the International Chamber of Commerce (ICC), which claims to protect businesses against losses caused by an earlier false ICC insurance guarantee. ICC officials this summer warned businesses against accepting deals underwritten by a counterfeit ICC “4081 Letter of Insurance Guarantee.”…

BY ALAN OSBORN AND KEITH NUTHALL
DETAILED allegations of irregularities in the budget of the European Commission made by the Commission’s former chief accountant Marta Andreasen are expected to be heard by the European Parliament early in 2003. Miss Andreasen was suspended by the Commission after her charges were made public this year.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
THE ORGANISATION for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) has launched a review of its guidelines on corporate governance, to assess how they might be reformed in the light of the accounting scandals that have dogged the US recently.…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
NEW rules affecting the operations and supervision of multi-national groups of companies in the EU will come into force shortly following agreement by the European Parliament today (Wednesday) of the Financial Conglomerates Directive; MEP’s accepted the latest draft approved by EU ministers, clearing the last hurdle preventing it becoming European law.…

BY ALAN OSBORN
THE EUROPEAN Court of Justice has come down on the side of the European Commission in a dispute with Germany, (which has been supported by Britain in this case), over the payment of VAT when petrol suppliers redeem money-off vouchers they had distributed to retailers through a middle-man.…

Keith Nuthall
THE EUROPEAN Commission is improving its auditing of scientific research projects receiving European Union (EU) money after the EU’s financial watchdog the Court of Auditors criticised past accounting controls.

It said that the Commission could have better monitored its outgoing EU Fifth Framework Programme for research (budget Euro 14.9 billion), which is being replaced in January by the Euro 16.2 billion Sixth Framework Programme (FP6).…

BY KEITH NUTHALL
The Europe Commission is proposing new guidelines for state aid for the disposal of slaughterhouse waste and fallen stock because different policies throughout the EU are creating “a serious risk of distortion of competition.” Franz Fischler, commissioner for agriculture, said that following the outbreak of BSE “what was a valuable product in the past is waste now, to be disposed of at high cost.”…

BY MARK ROWE
RUSSIAN veterinary officials have started inspecting US poultry exporters for the first time since new American sanitary guidelines came into force on September 15. Russia, the largest market for US poultry producers, banned imports of American poultry in March over concerns about production methods and salmonella.…