PARIS, March 24 (Reuters) - The Paris Court of Appeal has opened an investigation into former European Union border agency chief Fabrice Leggeri over allegations of complicity in crimes against humanity, a judicial source told Reuters on Tuesday.
Leggeri resigned from the EU's Frontex agency in 2022 after years of accusations from rights groups that the body mistreated migrants on external EU frontiers under his leadership, which began in 2015, at the height of Europe's migrant crisis.
Leggeri, who is now a European lawmaker with the French far-right National Rally party, has long denied these accusations. He declined to comment on Tuesday as he said he was unaware of the court's decision.
Should prosecutors seek to indict Leggeri, they would need to ask for his immunity as a member of the European Parliament to be waived, which would require a parliamentary vote.
The Paris court decided to open the probe on March 18 following an appeal by the French Human Rights League (LDH) and the migrant rights association Utopia 56, against an investigative judge's decision earlier to throw out their complaint against Leggeri.
The two groups accused Leggeri of encouraging Frontex's agents to help Libyan and Greek authorities intercept migrant vessels to prevent migrants from entering the EU.
The appeals court ruled that there were grounds to open a judicial investigation and found the appeal "partially well-founded", the source added.
The initial request to investigate Leggeri was made in 2024, LDH President Nathalie Tehio told Reuters, expectingthe probe to take a long time.
(Reporting by Gianluca Lo Nostro and Elizabeth Pineau; Additional reporting by Amina Ismail; Editing by Andrei Khalip)
