Answer given by Executive Vice-President Dombrovskis on behalf of the European Commission
22.11.2022
The Foreign Direct Investment (FDI) screening Regulation[1] sets up a cooperation between Member States and the Commission to assess and address if an FDI poses risks to security or public order in more than one Member State or in the context of programmes of EU interest.
The Commission may issue a confidential opinion to the Member State hosting the investment if it considers that a given FDI is likely to impact the public order or security of more than one Member State, to affect programmes or projects of EU interest or if the Commission has information relevant for the national assessment.
The Commission issues opinions only in relation to transactions of particular concern for the EU public order and/or security, which according to the latest annual report[2] concerned less than 3% of the cases notified to the cooperation mechanism in 2021.
Disclosing information about the countries and sectors of origin of the investors related to these cases would seriously undermine the Commission’s obligation to ensure the confidentiality of information transmitted under the cooperation mechanism.
It would also put at risk the interests of public order and security that the cooperation mechanism aims at protecting.
- [1] Regulation (EU) 2019/452 of the European Parliament and of the Council of 19 March 2019 establishing a framework for the screening of foreign direct investments into the Union.
- [2] Report from the Commission to the European Parliament and the Council — Second Annual Report on the screening of foreign direct investments into the Union (COM(2022)433).