Bodnar: we're waiting for EU Commission to approve Poland's EPPO accession

Bodnar said at the briefing held together with Kövesi that "Poland has taken steps towards joining the European Public Prosecutor Office.

"The decision was announced by Prime Minister Donald Tusk already in mid-December 2023, that we would be moving in this direction ... Now we are waiting for a reply from the European Commission," he added.

In his view, "it is a procedure of enhanced cooperation, which means that declaration on the government's part and a positive decision by the European Commission are enough to join the EPPO".

"We're not wasting our time, we've already taken preparatory work, technically leading to Poland becoming part of the EPPO, so that Poland could participate in this system," Bodnar said.

He called Poland's accession bid "an important process for the Polish prosecution service, revolutionary in itself". "I'm grateful for good will for cooperation, also for sharing experiences."

Bodnar informed that, ultimately, Poland wants to have 24 European prosecutors across three or four EPPO offices, in Warsaw and other cities.

Kövesi said at the conference that European and Polish institutions would be jointly fighting financial and organized crime. In her view, there are no countries completely free of corruption and tax fraud, while a belief that a single country could tackle these problems on its own is a "dangerous illusion".

The European Chief Prosecutor also stressed that all EPPO actions taken on the territory of Poland would be in line with Polish laws and settled before Polish courts. Kövesi also underscored that joining the EPPO does not mean that any foreign services will gain authority to operate in Poland.