An efficient and impartial European public prosecution service cannot exist without effective external independence of the EU institutions and the Member States. Likewise, the internal autonomy of its members is of utmost importance. The idea of independence has been underscored from the project’s inception in the late 1990s to Regulation 2017/2019 (hereinafter, the Regulation), which ultimately established the European Public Prosecutor’s Office (EPPO). In fact, independence is one of the EPPO’s main, if not its most important feature.

The effectiveness of the EPPO demands a functional interpretation of Art. 22(3) of the EPPO Regulation . Yet, the precise contour of this functional interpretation is far from being shaped, and such a task must be accomplished by practitioners, academics, and jurisprudence in the years to come.

One of the challenges for the European Public Prosecutor’s Office (EPPO), which the Member States identified during the negotiations on the EPPO Regulation, was the speed of criminal proceedings. How can we make sure that investigations will not take even longer with the addition of this new actor in the chain of criminal justice? Considering that most legal decisions during the investigation of a PIF crime will now be made in Luxembourg, will this make criminal proceedings even more bureaucratic?

The questionable decision to exclude the competence of the EPPO for criminal offences in respect of national direct taxes could adversely affect its capacity to fight VAT fraud.