Giovanni Kessler

Based in Brussels, OLAF is tasked with protecting the financial interests of the European Union by investigating fraud, corruption and any other illegal activities.

In 2023, he was sentenced to one year in prison, later reduced on appeal, for unlawfully intercepting the phone communications of the former EU Health Commissioner.

[1] From 1998 to 1999, Kessler was Deputy Head of the OSCE Kosovo Verification Mission in Pristina, in charge of Police and Justice matters.

In addition to his committee assignments, Kessler was also a member of the Italian delegation to the Parliamentary Assembly of the Organization for Security and Co-operation in Europe (OSCE).

In 2003, the OSCE Chairman-in-Office, Dutch Foreign Minister Jaap de Hoop Scheffer, appointed Kessler as his Special Representative during that year's parliamentary election in Armenia.

Later, the Council of the European Union decided that Kessler and Johan Denolf, from the anti-fraud unit of the Belgian judicial police, were their top two.

[6] Kessler took office in February 2011 and soon became engaged in a comprehensive reform process to strengthen the efficiency of OLAF, aiming to step-up the fight against fraud and corruption in Europe.

[8] In 2017, Marine Le Pen filed a lawsuit against OLAF and Kessler himself, charging that the anti-fraud office acted as a tool of President of the European Parliament Martin Schulz to undermine her and her party.