A Maltese EU administrator is being investigated by Belgian police for allegedly beating an Italian woman with a plaque during an “anti-Semitic rant” outside the Brussels headquarters.

Stefan Grech, 45, a European Commission administrator, is being investigated by for assaulting the woman and calling her “a dirty Jew” back in July.

The European Commission has also opened an internal investigation.

Mr Grech allegedly beat the senior official, who is not Jewish, with a metal plaque showing Benito Mussolini, the former Italian dictator and striking her in the face.

The Italian official, 50, whose identity has not been disclosed, was treated at a nearby hospital, where she is claiming doctors diagnosed her with concussion. In her complaint to the police, the woman said she was also seeing a psychologist to receive treatment for anxiety.

Mr Grech is the chairman of the EU labour union, Generation 2004. He is also Economy shadow minister Claudio Grech’s brother and a columnist with the General Workers union website iNews.

In 2002 he was convicted of possessing and distributing child pornography. He was handed a suspended sentence after the courts heard that he had been under psychiatric care long before the incident.