53 Katalin Ligeti, Angelo Marletta THE EUROPEAN PUBLIC PROSECUTOR’S OFFICE: WHAT ROLE FOR OLAF IN THE FUTURE? Katalin Ligeti, Angelo Marletta * The idea of a European Public Prosecutor has been part of academic and policy discussions on developing the European criminal justice area since the 1990s. Although there are no exact figures about how much money is lost through crime against the EU budget, it has been argued that the existing system of the protection of the financial interests of the EU does not ensure the sufficient detection and investigation of these offences. Against this back- ground, after nearly 15 years of scholarly and policy reflection, in July 2013, the EU Commission presented its proposal to set up the European Public Pros- ecutor’s Office [hereafter EPPO]. 1 Meanwhile negotiations are on-going in the Council and successive EU Presidencies (Greece, Italy, Latvia, Luxembourg) have substantially revised the text. This contribution aims at highlighting the contradictions of the present negotiations on the EPPO. It shall start with explaining the reasons for an EPPO (1) and the initial and still pertaining disagreement between the Mem- ber States how to fill the existing gap in the enforcement of the EU budget (2). As it will be shown, the on-going negotiations have turned the idea of a European (supranational) judicial body – as presented by the original proposal of the Commission – into an increasingly intergovernmental agency (3). By taking the example of evidence law, it will be argued that a collegiate EPPO working with national substantive and procedural law as spelled out in the lat- est version of the negotiated text will not solve the problems that it was called to answer (4). The concluding remarks (5) shall take into account the overall institutional panorama of European criminal justice bodies and agencies and will reflect on the need for OLAF in the future next to the EPPO. 1. ENFORCEMENT GAP IN THE PROTECTION OF THE EU’S FINANCIAL INTEREST The perception that the financial resources of the European Communities are not protected adequately started to emerge in the 1980s at European level. The gradual expansion of supranational competences and the increasing signif- ∗ Dr. Katalin Ligeti, Professor of European and international criminal law, University of Luxembourg. Dr. Angelo Marletta, post doctoral researcher, University of Luxembourg. 1 Proposal for a Council Regulation on the establishment of the European Public Prosecutor’s Office, 17 July 2013, COM (2013) 534 final [hereinafter: Commission’s Proposal].