Frankfurt overtakes Madrid as the headquarters of the European Union's anti-money laundering office

The new European Authority for Combating Money Laundering and Terrorist Financing (AMLA, for its acronym in English) will not be headquartered in the Cristal Madrid Tower, the symbolic building that the Community of Madrid has offered to host – but rather there is this new European agency. The Spanish nomination did not receive the necessary votes in the joint vote held yesterday by the Council and the European Parliament, which chose to elect the German city of Frankfurt (Germany).

In addition to the Spanish capital and the German city, which already hosts the headquarters of the European Central Bank, Rome (Italy), Vienna (Austria), Vilnius (Lithuania), Riga (Latvia) and Dublin (Ireland) have also submitted applications. Paris (France) and Brussels (Belgium). According to the voting procedures – which are secret in nature – the Member States and the European Chamber each obtained 27 votes respectively. In other words, 27 votes for the Council – one for each country – and 27 for the European Parliament distributed among the different political groups: PPE (8), Socialists and Democrats (6), Renewal (4), Greens (3), European Council (3) ID (2) and European Left (1).

Convince one member of the European Parliament

To be elected, it was necessary to obtain a simple majority of at least 28 votes out of 54 valid votes, which is exactly what Frankfurt obtained, which needed only one round of voting to be elected. According to European sources, Madrid received 16 votes; Paris 6 and Rome 4.

In the initial negotiations, the EU's permanent ambassadors agreed to support the Frankfurt offer (before Paris, Rome and Vilnius in another preliminary vote in which Madrid received only 6 votes, according to European sources), meaning that on paper it was enough to persuade an MEP to accept the Frankfurt offer. . Imbalance of balance. For its part, Parliament arrived with a short list of candidates that included Frankfurt, Madrid, Paris and Rome. According to various sources, this MP is German from the far-right Alternative for Germany party, Gunnar Beck.