'Misspending to the XXXTREME!' Eurocrats accused of giving EU funds to a Czech BROTHEL
RED-FACED eurocrats have ordered an urgent inquiry into the use of European Union funds after taxpayers’ cash was apparently used to renovate a brothel.
Brussels splashed out on a new roof and frontage for the seedy sex spot, known as Party night club XXX, where young Russian girls sell their bodies.
The embarrassing mix-up came about after the owner of the building applied for funding from an EU cash pot designed to boost rural tourism.
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Funds were apparently signed off to pay for new insulation for the remote building after the application was lodged under the name ‘Pension Retro’.
The brothel, near the village of Cheb in the Czech Republic, received around 40,000 euros to carry out the work, according to a furious Italian MEP.
Mario Borghezio said: “The brothel, probably a converted farmhouse, stands in open country and has one side facing a very thick wood.
“Displayed on the front, which has been restored to pristine condition, are an illuminated red heart and a large ‘XXX’ sign, an eloquent symbol of paid sex.
“The only customers allowed in are men, whereas the workforce consists — apparently — of about 15 girls.
“Is the Commission aware of this case in which misuse of European funding has been taken to the extreme?
“Will it not carry out a thorough check on the regularity and recoverability of the funding concerned?”
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Is the Commission aware of this case in which misuse of European funding has been taken to the extreme?
In a reply to the MEP, the EU Commission said it had launched an urgent investigation into the scandal.
Commissioner Phil Hogan said: “The Commission has contacted the competent Czech authorities asking to report on the details of this particular project.
“It will then, as appropriate, refer the matter to the European Anti-Fraud Office for a possible investigation.”
Officials in the Czech Republic said the converted farmhouse, which is near the country’s border with Germany, was paid money from the European Fund For Rural Development as it is officially run as a boarding house.
However, the company website openly advertises it as a sex hotspot and when a local female journalist visited the site the door was answered by a young woman with a Russian accent, who told her that only men are admitted.
Marketa Jezkova, a spokeswoman for the Czech Agriculture Ministry, said the authorities are now attempting to recoup the money handed out to the brothel.
She said: "At the moment, administrative proceedings on return of the subsidy are being held with the subsidy recipient.”
She added that the cash was paid out under the condition that the building - supposedly a guest house - would serve the same purpose for at least five years.
Miroslav Podlipsky, director of the body in charge of doling out EU subsidies in the Cheb region, said his department had “initiated the investigation” but seemed to imply they handed out cash largely on trust.
He said: “We did not expect anyone to be so impudent as to spend the money and not to do what they should have done.”
