January 25 (SeeNews) - The European Public Prosecutor’s Office (EPPO) said that it arrested five people in Czechia, Bulgaria and Slovakia as part of an investigation into a cross-border VAT fraud scheme spanning ten EU member states, including Slovenia.
The action day involved 61 searches of business premises and the homes of people directly related to a missing trader intra-community fraud scheme which the office started investigating in 2021, shortly after it became operational, EPPO said in a press statement on Tuesday.
The operation took place across Austria, Bulgaria, Czechia, Estonia, Germany, Hungary, Lithuania, the Netherlands, Slovakia and Slovenia. The prosecutor estimates that the group's criminal activity has led to damages of 32 million euro ($34.8 million).
"The goal is to gather evidence and uncover more information about the organised criminal group trading small electronic goods from Germany and selling them via so-called missing traders all over Europe," EPPO said in the statement.
This was the third action day of the investigation, which is backed by German tax investigation units from four cities, including Berlin.
($ = 0.9205 euro)