Maria Arena no longer had a choice.

On Wednesday evening, the Belgian socialist resigned from chairing the Human Rights Committee in the European Parliament.

Otherwise, the conference of parliamentary group leaders would have initiated formal voting procedures on Thursday, as was the case recently against Eva Kaili, who lost her post as vice president after the judiciary found large amounts of cash on her and put her in custody on suspicion of corruption.

Arena is also concerned with the scandal of influence by Qatar and Morocco, which has shaken parliament for a month.

Thomas Gutschker

Political correspondent for the European Union, NATO and the Benelux countries based in Brussels.

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In May she took part in a conference on human rights in Doha, and she had her flights and hotel paid for by the host, the Emirate of Qatar.

This only came out on Wednesday because Arena had not reported it to the parliamentary administration.

First, she blamed her secretary for the breach of the rules and sent an email to her fellow parliamentarians to ask for understanding.

But nobody wanted to raise that anymore.

Because the authority of the 56-year-old politician from Wallonia had already been shaken in the past few days when new details from the investigation became known.

Old school politicians

"I declare in no uncertain terms that I am in no way involved in this scandal," Arena said in her resignation statement.

The Belgian authorities did not ask for her parliamentary immunity to be waived, nor did she search her office or home.

Indeed, this distinguishes her from the other MEPs who are under investigation.

Nonetheless, it plays an important role in this case.

Because of her role as chair of a committee that was at the center of Qatari interest because it dealt with the situation in the emirate.

And because of her proximity to Pier Antonio Panzeri, who, like Kaili, is in custody and, from what is known so far, was the spider in the web of influence.

The 67-year-old social democrat was a member of the European Parliament from 2004 to 2019.

He is described by his comrades as an "old-school" politician, which in this case means: Panzeri was a communist and union secretary before he turned left-wing democrat.

From 2017 he led the Human Rights Committee, or DROI for short, in Parliament, a largely independent sub-committee of the Foreign Affairs Committee.

After losing his mandate in the European elections, he founded an organization in Brussels called "Fight Impunity", which claimed to work to protect human rights worldwide.

In fact, it was more of a front organization to exert influence for powerful clients like Qatar.

"A system had to be found that would not trigger an alarm," said Panzeri's right-hand man, Francesco G., to investigators.

G. was Panzeri's assistant in Parliament and co-founder of "Fight Impunity".

He is the partner of Eva Kailis, both have a two-year-old daughter.