The European Investment Bank’s decision to keep secret the entire report on how it was misled into lending €400m to emissions-cheating Volkswagen is “not acceptable”, according to Green MEP Heidi Hautala.
The Finnish deputy told EUobserver that she thought the whole report should be made public, but it was “outrageous” that the bank did not grant at least partial access to the document.
“It is really a shame that our European Investment Bank is behaving in this way,” she said.
Last week, the European Investment Bank (EIB) told EUobserver that it would not disclose a report written by anti-fraud office Olaf. The document details how German carmaker Volkswagen was able to acquire a €400m loan while keeping from the EIB that it was producing diesel cars with emissions cheating software.
Volkswagen Group had equipped around 8.5m cars with so-called defeat devices, which led to emissions on the road being much higher than in the required laboratory test.
Citizens of the EU in principle have the right to see EU documents, but sometimes there can be exceptions that allow an EU body to keep papers confidential – for example when releasing them could infringe on somebody’s privacy or could harm relations with a third country.
However, there is also the possibility to redact documents and then grant partial access.
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