HARMONIZATION OR UNIFICATION? – INSTRUMENTS FOR A MORE EFFECTIVE PROTECTION OF THE FINANCIAL INTERESTS OF THE EUROPEAN UNION

The objective of the article is to analyse the efforts of the European Union for the protection of its financial interests. The first part of the paper sets out the brief historical development of the criminal law protection of the financial interests of the European Union with particular emphasis on the strengthened and reinforced legal framework provided by the Treaty of Lisbon. The second part of the study focuses to the newly adopted Directive of the EU on the fight against fraud to the Union’s financial interests by means of criminal law. However, the paper does not intend to analyse the provisions of the Directive in details, it only aims to examine whether it can provide for an effective and unified protection to the financial interests of the European Union.

the criminal offences the Member State where the chance of the criminal conviction is less likely and where the penalty is the most lenient. 9 These factors forces the European Union to seek for the establishment of a unified, supranational framework in connection with the protection its financial interests.
In a recent Communication, the European Commission also stressed the importance of the unified EU action against these criminal offences. The Commission considers it as an immense problem thatdespite the previous attempts of the EU to provide for minimum standardsthere is still a wide variation across the Union in the definitions of criminal offences affecting the financial interests, in the sanctions which those offences attract, and in the time limitations for these crimes. These shortcomings mostly result from the variety of legal traditions and legal systems of the Member States which lead to divergent judicial practices. However, because of the different legal regulation of the Member States, the level of deterrence varies across the Union, which hinders the equivalent criminal law protection across the European Union and leads to differing outcomes in similar individual cases, depending on the applicable national criminal provisions. Therefore, the European Commission concluded that the financial interests of the European Union are not equivalently protected across the EU as regards criminal law and the deterrent effect of the Union's instrument is not sufficient. 10 Therefore, in order to ensure the effective, proportionate and dissuasive protection of the Union's financial interests, one of the main objectives of the European Union is to create a unified or at least harmonized regulation of the criminal offences affecting its financial interests.

II. THE CRIMINAL LAW PROTECTION OF THE FINANCIAL INTERESTS OF THE EUROPEAN UNION 1. Historical development before the Treaty of Lisbon
Although the European Union promptly recognized the need for the unified action for the protection of its financial interests, the first criminal law measures were adapted as a result of a long development.
The Founding Treaties of the European Communities originally did not contain any criminal law provisions in connection with the protection of financial interests. The main reason of this is that the competences of the European Communities did not cover the field of criminal law in the first few decades of the history of the European integration, since criminal law was 9 LIGETI: Op. cit. p. 22. 10 Communication from the Commission to the European Parliament, the Council, the European Economic and Social Committee and the Committee of the Regions -On the protection of the financial interests of the European Union by criminal law and by administrative investigations: An integrated policy to safeguard taxpayers' money [COM(2011) 293, 26.5.2011.]. Apart from the problems resulting from the differences between the criminal law systems of the Member States, the Communication of the European Commission also lists several other shortcomings in connection with procedural questions. Criminal investigations of fraud and other crimes against the financial interests of the Union are characterized by a patchy legal and procedural framework: police, prosecutors and judges in the Member States decide on the basis of their own national rules whether and, if so, how they intervene to protect the EU budget. Under the current framework, such criminal investigations are handled by individual Member States' prosecution services acting under their respective criminal law. However, the competent authorities of Member States do not always appear to have sufficient legal means at their disposal and appropriate structures in place to adequately prosecute cases affecting the EU. In a certain number of cases involving fraud against the EU budget, national criminal investigative authorities refrain from opening investigations. The protection of the EU budget often involves investigating cross-border cases and enforcing decisions abroad, however, the cooperation mechanisms between the Member States are not effective. Judicial authorities of the Member States are be reluctant to trigger mutual legal assistance measures, because of their complexity, the lengthy procedures and the uncertainty of the results. Even where mutual legal assistance between administrative and judicial authorities of Member States is requested, it is often not followed up with sufficient expediency. The results of EU administrative investigations frequently remain unused by national criminal courts because of restrictive procedural rules which include limits on the use of evidence collected in a foreign jurisdiction. The use of such evidence is often not considered sufficient to open criminal investigations. considered as one of the main symbols and the last rampart of the national sovereignty. 11 Therefore, the actions of the European Union aiming at the combatting of the illicit actions against the EU budget have been limited to the administrative law measures for a long time. However, despite the explicit authorization by the primary law, the European Community relatively early recognized that administrative means are not sufficient for the effective protection of the financial interests against fraud and other illicit activities. Therefore, the use of criminal law instruments as a final mean, ultima ratio is also necessary. 12 The importance of the criminal law protection of financial interests of the European Communities was significantly increased in the 1970s, when the system of the Communities' budget of the was restructured, the own resources of the budget were introduced and the common agricultural policy was created. Due to these factors new financial resources has been opened, which enabled significant abuses. 13 Recognizing the danger, the European Commission drew up a Draft Convention 14 in 1976, in order to ensure the uniform criminal law protection of the Communities' financial interests. However, the draft ultimately failed due to the resistance of the Member States, which considered that the protection of national interests is more important than the protection of Communities' interests, and regarded national law as appropriate for the protection of national and supranational interests. Therefore, the Member States did not feel the Community legislation to be justified at this time. 15 Due to the lack of the criminal competence of the European Communities, criminal sanctioning of the unlawful acts against its financial interests therefore remained within the competence of the Member States, and the Community legislator used primarily administrative means to protect these supranational interests until the 1990s. 16 The judgement of the European Court of Justice in the so-called Greek Maize case in 1989 can be considered as an important milestone in the history of the protection of the financial interests. According to the ruling, the Member States are requiredby virtue of Article 5 of the EEC-Treaty 17to penalize any persons who infringe Community law in the same way as they penalize those who infringe national law. The choice of penalties remains within the discretion of the Member States; however, they must ensure that infringements of Community law are 11  penalized under conditions, both procedural and substantive, which are analogous to those applicable to infringements of national law of a similar nature and importance and which, make the penalty effective, proportionate and dissuasive. Moreover, the national authorities must proceed, with respect to infringements of Community law, with the same diligence as that which they bring to bear in implementing corresponding national laws. 18 As it can be seen, the so-called assimilation principle formulated in the ruling of the ECJ obliges the Member States to extend the scope of the criminal offences protecting the national legal interests to the supranational interests of a similar nature and importance. 19 Accordingly, if a Member State provides for criminal law sanctions for offences against its own budget under national law, it must also penalize acts committed against the same supranational legal interests, i.e. against the EU budget. 20 In this respect, the principle of assimilation has imposed an explicit criminalization obligation on Member States for the first time in the history of the European integration.
The principle of assimilation elaborated by the European Court of Justice was incorporated by the Maastricht Treaty signed in 1992, which established the so-called three pillar structure of the European Union. According to the provisions of the Treaty, the Member States shall take the same measures to counter fraud affecting the financial interests of the Community as they take to counter fraud affecting their own financial interests. Furthermore, the Member States shall coordinate their action aimed at protecting the financial interests of the Community against fraud and they shall organize, with the help of the Commission, close and regular cooperation between the competent departments of their administrations. 21 As a result of the Treaty of Maastricht, the fight against fraud became the part of the primary law of the European Union.
The regulation of the Treaty of Maastricht was taken over and significantly expanded by the Treaty of Amsterdam in 1997. One of the significant modifications of the Treaty was that the Council has been invested with a legislative power to adopt the necessary measures in the fields of the prevention of and fight against fraud affecting the financial interests of the Community with a view to affording effective and equivalent protection in the Member States. The limits of the legislative competence of the Council were that the adopted measures could concern neither the application of national criminal law nor the national administration of justice. 22 Because of this restriction, the majority of the opinions in the legal literature argued that the competence of the European Union under Article 280(4) of the EC-Treaty was limited to noncriminal measures and that the Treaty did not empower the Union to adopt supranational criminal law provisions within the framework of the first pillar. 23 However, within the framework of the third pillar of the European Union 24 , the Treaty of Maastricht declared that the Member States regardamong othersthe fight against fraud on an international scale as matters of common interest, for the purposes of achieving the objectives of the Union and without prejudice to the powers of the European Community. 25 In accordance with the provisions of the Treaty, the Council was empowered to adopt special third pillar legal instruments (joint positions, joint actions, conventions and later framework decisions) in this field. 26 This opened the way for the EU legislator to adopt criminal law measureswithin the framework of the third pillar cooperation, in specific sources of lawin respect of the protection of the financial interests for the first time in the history of integration.
Based on the authorization of the Treaty, the Member States of the European Union signed a Convention on the protection of the European Communities' financial interests on the 26 th June 1995. 27 The so-called PIF Convention, which laid down the cornerstones of the coherent and united EU action against criminal offences affecting the financial interests, set out the definition of fraud affecting the European Communities' financial interests and required Member States to criminalize the described conducts and to impose effective, proportionate and dissuasive sanctions. 28 Three Additional Protocols were later added to the PIF Convention, which prescribed the sanctioning of other criminal offences affecting the financial interests of the European Union (corruption and money laundering) and regulated the responsibility of legal persons. 29 The PIF Convention and its Additional Protocols were undoubtedly important steps in the fight against illegal offences detrimental to the Union's financial interests, since they were the first documents which explicitly provided for criminal sanctions for crimes affecting the EU budget. However, due to prolonged ratification and the incomplete or inadequate transposition of the PIF instruments by Member States 30 , they could not be able to contribute sufficiently to the harmonization of criminal justice systems of the Member States and therefore they could little provide for a more effective protection of the financial interests of the EU. 31

The protection of the financial interests of the EU in the Treaty of Lisbon
The Treaty of Lisbon entered into force in 2009 was an important milestone in the development of the European criminal integration as well as in the history of the protection of the financial interests of the European Union. The Treaty of Lisbon abolished the pillar system, as a result of which the former third pillar has disappeared and the judicial cooperation in 24 Cooperation in the fields of Justice and Home Affairs. 25 Point 5 of Article K.1 of the EU-Treaty. 26 Article 3(2) of the EU-Treaty. 27 Council Act of 26 July 1995 drawing up the Convention on the protection of the European Communities' financial interests [OJ C 316, 27.11.1995, pp. 48-57.] (hereinafter referred to as: PIF Convention) 28 It also has to be mentioned that parallel with the PIF Convention, the European Union also adopted a Regulation which contains the administrative means of the protection of the financial interests. See criminal matters of the European Union has become an independent, homogeneous, supranational policy. 32 The Treaty of Lisbon empowered the European Union with broad legislative competences in the field of criminal law and of the protection of the financial interests and enabled the adoption of the traditional secondary sources of law (regulations and directives). This was a significant step forward, sincecontrary to the previous third pillar legal acts, like the PIF Conventionthe Union now has effective tools to monitor the implementation of regulations and directives and to sanction Member States which fail to comply to implement or infringe the adopted EU legal acts. 33 The criminal law competences of the European Union under the Treaty of Lisbon which can be used for the protection of the financial interests can be divided into four categories. 34 1. The legal harmonization competence of Article 83(1) TFEU enables the European Union to establish minimum rules concerning the definition of criminal offences and sanctions in the areas of particularly serious crime with a cross-border dimension. For the use of the Union's legal harmonization competence two cumulative criteria are required to be met: the particular seriousness and the cross-border dimension of the crime, which is defined by three alternative requirements: the nature of the crime, the impact of the offence, or the special need to combat the area of crime on a common basis. 35 The ten socalled 'eurocrimes' are listed in the Treaty: terrorism, trafficking in human beings and sexual exploitation of women and children, illicit drug trafficking, illicit arms trafficking, money laundering, corruption, counterfeiting of means of payment, computer crime and organised crime. However, the Treaty does not contain an exhaustive enumeration, because on the basis of developments in crime additional areas of crime which fulfil the general requirements can be added to the list. 36

III. DIRECTIVE ON THE FIGHT AGAINST FRAUD TO THE UNION'S FINANCIAL INTERESTS BY MEANS OF CRIMINAL LAW
The PIF Directive aims to establish minimum rules concerning the definition of criminal offences and sanctions with regard to combatting fraud and other illegal activities affecting the Union's financial interests, with a view to strengthening protection against criminal offences which affect those financial interests, in line with the acquis of the Union in this field. 42 In order to achieve this objective, the Directive defines the criminal offences of fraud affecting the 38  Union's financial interests 43 and other criminal offences affecting financial interests (active and passive corruption, money laundering and misappropriation). 44 The Directive obliges the Member States to criminalize the described conducts and punish them with effective, proportionate and dissuasive criminal sanctions. In the most serious cases, the Directive also prescribes the minimum amount of the maximum penalty the Member States are required to prescribe. It means that the aforementioned criminal offences have to be punishable by a maximum penalty of at least four years of imprisonment when they involve considerable damage or advantage, which involves more than EUR 100.000. However, the Member States may provide for sanctions other than criminal sanctions, where the criminal offence involves damage or an advantage of less than EUR 10.000. 45 Furthermore, the Directive regulates the liability of legal persons 46 , the question of jurisdiction 47 and the limitation period for the aforementioned criminal offences. 48 As it can be seen, the PIF Directive aims the harmonize the criminal law systems of the Member States in connection with the criminal offences and sanctions relating the crimes affecting the Union's financial interests. This objective is also stressed by the Preamble of the PIF Directive, according to which Member States should provide for certain types and levels of sanctions when the criminal offences defined in the Directive are committed in order to ensure equivalent protection of the Union's financial interests throughout the Union by means of measures which should act as a deterrent. 49 However, if the provisions of the PIF Directive are analysed in details, it can be seen that the aim of the unified and equivalent protection of the financial interests of the European Union cannot completely be achieved. 50 This fact follows both from the legal basis and from the content of the Directive.

The legal basis of the PIF Directive
The European Commission originally initiated to adopt the PIF Directive based on the legal competence of Article 325(4) TFEU. According to the justification of the Commission, Article 325 TFEU confers upon the Union strong powers to adopt 'measures' which 'act as a deterrent' and 'afford effective' and 'equivalent protection', which comprises by nature, and historically a criminal law dimension. Criminal law is needed in order to have a preventive effect in this area, where the threat of criminal law sanctions and their effect on the reputation of the potential perpetrators, can be presumed to act as a strong disincentive to commit the illegal act in the first place. Article 325 TFEU therefore includes the power to enact criminal law provisions in the context of the protection of Union's financial interests against all angles of illegal attacks. 51 43 Under Article 2(1)(a) of the PIF Directive, the definition of the Union's financial interests' means all revenues, expenditure and assets covered by, acquired through, or due to the Union budget; or the budgets of the Union institutions, bodies, offices and agencies established pursuant to the Treaties or budgets directly or indirectly managed and monitored by them. 44 Articles 3-4 of the PIF Directive. 45 Article 7 of the PIF Directive. 46 Article 6 and 9 of the PIF Directive. 47 Article 11 of the PIF Directive. 48  During the negotiation process of the PIF Directive, however, the legal basis was modified to Article 83(2) TFEU by the Council 52 and the European Parliament 53 . According to the Opinion of the Legal Service of the Council, the legal basis in Article 325(4) TFEU could not be interpreted widely as to cover also harmonisation of criminal offences and sanctions. According to the CLS, a legislative proposal that aims at 'defining criminal offences and sanctions' in connection with fraud and other illegal activities affecting the Union's financial interests cannot eschew Article 83(2) TFEU as a legal basis in favour of a provision such as Article 325(4) TFEU. The legal basis in Article 83(2) TFEU aims to tackle all cases where the EU legislature needs to harmonise the definition of criminal offences and sanctions in order to make othernon-criminal law -EU harmonised measures more effective. Therefore, the approximation of criminal law through the definition of criminal offences and sanctions for the purposes of effective implementation of other non-criminal Union policies is to be made under Article 83(2) TFEU. 54 Apart from the theoretical debates 55 in connection with the adequate legal basis for the protection of the financial interests of the European Union, the modification of the legal basis of the PIF Directive had several practical consequences as well. It can be stated that the legal basis of Article 83 TFEU could provide for a much lesser unified protection of the financial interests of the European Union than a legal act adopted based on Article 325, since there are several important differences between the two legal provisions. norms which can serve not only as the harmonization but also as the unification of the national criminal laws of the Member States. 2. Minimum harmonization or unification? Secondly, Article 83 TFEU only prescribes the adoption of minimum rules with regard to the definition of criminal offences and sanctions. It means that this legal provision only provides for minimum harmonization, whereby the Member States are free to adopt or maintain more stringent rules for criminal offences affecting the Union's financial interests. 58 The provision of Article 325 TFEU does not contain such restriction, due to whichas it was stated beforethe EU legislation can not only harmonize but to unify the legal system of the Member States. . 59 Consequently, due to the emergency brake rule and the opt-out possibilities, if a legislative proposal is adopted on the basis of Article 83 TFEU, it is likely that it would not apply to every Member States. In relation of Article 325 TFEU these restrictions do not apply, as a consequence of which a legal act adopted under this legal basis can be legally binding to all Member States. Therefore, it can be concluded that Article 325 TFEU could ensure a more unified protection of the financial interests of the European Union, while Article 83 TFEU contains special provision which aims to protect the sovereignty and the different legal systems and traditions of the Member States.

The provisions of the PIF Directive
Apart from its legal basis, the regulation of the PIF Directive also contains several elements, because of which the Directive cannot really contribute in the unified protection of the financial interests of the European Union. The reason of these provisions is mostly the minimum harmonization method of the PIF Directive.
As it was already mentioned, the PIF Directive defines the element of the criminal offences of fraud and other delicts affecting financial interests as well as the sanctions which can be imposed on the perpetrator of the aforementioned crimes. However, due to the fact that the Member States are entitled to maintain stricter rules, they are free to criminalize other conducts, prescribe other elements of the crimes which are not regulated in the Directive or define higher level of sanctions. This speciality of the Directive can result that differences still remain in the regulation of the criminal offences concerned in the Member States. Hereinafter, the paper cites some examples from these provisions of the PIF Directive.

Regulation of the criminal offences
The PIF Directive requires the Member States to take the necessary measures to ensure that the described conducts constitute a criminal offence, however, only if these are committed intentionally. 60 However, the Member States are free to decide to criminalize the offences when they are committed recklessly or by serious negligence. As a result of this, it can happen that only intentional fraud, corruption, money laundering or misappropriation is punishable in one part of the Member States, while these criminal offences or at least some of them are also criminalized in the other part of the States, if they are committed negligently or recklessly.
In connection with the criminal offence of fraud, the PIF Directive distinguishes between procurement-related and non-procurement related expenditure. However, relating to the procurement-related expenditures, the Directive criminalized the described conducts 'at least' when they are committed in order to make an unlawful gain for the perpetrator or another by causing a loss to the Union's financial interests. 61 In this case, it is not sufficient that the perpetrator aimed at obtaining an advantage, damage needs to be caused in addition with it. 62 However, Member States can decide to prescribe stricter regulation and penalize these conducts in the absence of the aforementioned conditions as well. Therefore, the protection of the procurement-related expenditures may vary in the territory of the European Union.
Another example for the failure of the complete unification of the criminal offences is the highly debated 63 issue of the VAT-fraud. Based on the compromise reached by the EU institutions, in connection of these offences the PIF Directive applies only in cases of serious offences against the common VAT system, which means that the criminal offence has to be connected with the territory of two or more Member States of the Union and involve a total damage of at least EUR 10.000.000. 64 The VAT-fraud cases which do not meet the aforementioned criteria remain within the regulatory competence of the Member States, which can lead to the survival of the diverse national regulations. The limited scope of application in connection with VAT-fraud therefore significantly weakens the added value of the PIF Directive. 65 In connection with VAT-fraud, it is also important to highlight that the Court of Justice of the European Union also expressed that the fight against VAT-fraud falls within the scope of competence of the European Union. According to the CJEU, there is a direct link between, on the one hand, the collection of VAT revenue in compliance with the Community law applicable and, on the other, the availability to the Community budget of the corresponding VAT resources, since any lacuna in the collection of the first potentially causes a reduction in the second. It results that any reduction in VAT resources must be offset by means of a reduction in expenditure or an increase in GNI-based own resources, which is likely to affect the general equilibrium of the system of own resources intended to cover Community expenditure. 66 In the Taricco case, the CJEU also stated that criminal penalties are essential to combat certain serious cases of VAT evasion in an effective and dissuasive manner and that the definition of fraud in the PIF Directive covers revenue derived from applying a uniform rate to the harmonised VAT assessment bases determined according to EU rules. 67

Incitement, aiding, abetting and attempt
According to the PIF Directive, the Member States are obliged to take the necessary measures to ensure that inciting, aiding and abetting the commission of as well as the attempt to commit any of the aforementioned criminal offences are punishable as criminal offences. 68 However, the Directive fails to give a definition of the incitement, aiding and abetting and attempt. In the absence of common autonomous EU definitions, the own and possibly different national criminal law regulations of the Member States have to be applied to these concepts. As result of the fundamentally different dogmatic approaches of the Member States relating to the stages of perpetration and the accessory perpetrators, the same act could be considered punishable in one State while it could remain unpunished in another State. 69

Regulation of the criminal sanctions
The minimum harmonization regulation method can clearly be observed in the provisions of the PIF Directive relating to the sanctions which also disable the unification and provide the possibility for derogation to the Member States.
As a general rule, the PIF Directive repeats the formula of the ruling of the European Court of Justice in the Greek Maize case, i.e. that the criminal offences have to be punishable by effective, proportionate and dissuasive criminal sanctions. 70 However, this provision does define neither the type, nor the level of the sanctions to be applied, therefore the Directive leave the Member States a great discretionary power to prescribe the applicable criminal sanctions. 71 According the PIF Directive, Member States are required to take the necessary measures to ensure that the criminal offences are punishable by a maximum penalty of at least four years of imprisonment when they involve considerable damage or advantage, i.e. when the damage or advantage involves more than EUR 100.000 or more than EUR 10.000.000 in case of revenue arising from VAT own resources. 72 However, this provision only obliges the Member States not to prescribe less than four years of imprisonment, but they are entitled to introduce or maintain stricter penalties (e.g. five, eight or ten years of imprisonment). It can therefore be seen that the minimum harmonization does not eliminate the currently existing diverging sanctioning systems, as a result of which it can easily happen that the same offence is punished by four years of imprisonment in one Member State and by eight years of imprisonment in another Member State. 73 Furthermore, the PIF Directive enables the Member States to provide for sanctions other than criminal sanctions, where a criminal offence involves a damage or an advantage of less than EUR 10.000. 74 This is naturally only a possibility for the Member States; therefore, it can happen that an offence with a damage of less than EUR 10.000 is a criminal offence in one Member States and an administrative offence in another Member State. It can be seen that this provision does not promote the unified protection of the financial interests of the European Union. 75

The limitation period
The PIF Directive contains regulations in connection with the limitation period for the criminal offences affecting the Union's financial interests. According to the Directive, the Member States are required take the necessary measures to provide for a limitation period that enables the investigation, prosecution, trial and judicial decision of the criminal offences affecting the financial interests for a sufficient period of time after the commission of the offences, in order for those criminal offences to be tackled effectively. In case of serious criminal offences, which are punishable by a maximum sanction of at least four years of imprisonment, the limitation period has to be at least five years from the time when the offence was committed. However, the Member States can establish a shorter limitation period, which must not be shorter than three years, provided that the period may be interrupted or suspended in the event of specified acts. 76 As it can be seen from these provisions, the approximation of the limitation period for the criminal offences affecting the financial interests of the European Union is also partial and the regulation of the PIF Directive does not provide for a complete unification of the national laws of the Member States. 77 On the one hand, the Directive only define the length of the limitation period in connection with the serious criminal offences punishable with at least four years of imprisonment. For the less serious offences, the Directive only obliges the Member States to prescribe sufficient period of time, which means that the Member States have absolute discretionary power to decide on the length of the limitation period. On the other hand, even in connection with the most serious criminal offences, the PIF Directive only specify a minimum limitation period of fiveor under certain circumstances threeyears, which does not prevent the Member States to maintain stricter rules and to define longer limitation periods.

The material scope of competence of the European Public Prosecutor's Office
Although the paper does not aim to analyse the European Public Prosecutor's Office in details, it is important to draw the attention to one of the most important features of the EPPO Regulation, since it has direct connection with the PIF Directive and it can also be regarded as an obstacle of the unified protection of the financial interests of the European Union. This crucial point of the EPPO Regulation is the provision relating to the material competence of the European Public Prosecutor's Office.
According to the EPPO Regulation and in line with Article 86(2) TFEU, the European Public Prosecutor's Office shall be competent in respect of the criminal offences affecting the financial interests of the Union that are provided for in the PIF Directive as implemented by national law. It means that the competence of the EPPO covers the criminal offences defined in the PIF Directive, i.e. fraud affecting the Union's financial interests 78 , money laundering, active and passive corruption and misappropriation, irrespective of whether the same criminal conduct could be classified as another type of offence under national law. 79 It can therefore be seen that the EPPO Regulation refers back to the PIF Directive and to its implementation by the Member States. The competence of the European Public Prosecutor's Office is therefore bound to the