1. Where, in accordance with the applicable national law, there are reasonable grounds to believe that an offence within the competence of the EPPO is being or has been committed, a European Delegated Prosecutor in a Member State which according to its national law has jurisdiction over the offence shall, without prejudice to the rules set out in Article 25(2) and (3), initiate an investigation and note this in the case management system.
2. Where upon verification in accordance with Article 24(6), the EPPO decides to initiate an investigation, it shall without undue delay inform the authority that reported the criminal conduct in accordance with Article 24(1) or (2).
3. Where no investigation has been initiated by a European Delegated Prosecutor, the Permanent Chamber to which the case has been allocated shall, under the conditions set out in paragraph 1, instruct a European Delegated Prosecutor to initiate an investigation.
4. A case shall as a rule be initiated and handled by a European Delegated Prosecutor from the Member State where the focus of the criminal activity is or, if several connected offences within the competences of the EPPO have been committed, the Member State where the bulk of the offences has been committed. A European Delegated Prosecutor of a different Member State that has jurisdiction for the case may only initiate or be instructed by the competent Permanent Chamber to initiate an investigation where a deviation from the rule set out in the previous sentence is duly justified, taking into account the following criteria, in order of priority:
(a)
the place of the suspect’s or accused person’s habitual residence;
(b)
the nationality of the suspect or accused person;
(c)
the place where the main financial damage has occurred.
5. Until a decision to prosecute under Article 36 is taken, the competent Permanent Chamber may, in a case concerning the jurisdiction of more than one Member State and after consultation with the European Prosecutors and/or European Delegated Prosecutors concerned, decide to:
(a)
reallocate the case to a European Delegated Prosecutor in another Member State;
(b)
merge or split cases and, for each case choose the European Delegated Prosecutor handling it,
if such decisions are in the general interest of justice and in accordance with the criteria for the choice of the handling European Delegated Prosecutor in accordance with paragraph 4 of this Article.
6. Whenever the Permanent Chamber is taking a decision to reallocate, merge or split a case, it shall take due account of the current state of the investigations.
7. The EPPO shall inform the competent national authorities without undue delay of any decision to initiate an investigation.