An open letter sent by the civil society group Occupy Justice asks the new European Council President Charles Michel how he could host a Prime Minister whose hands are tainted with blood.
The letter was sent on the eve of the European Council summit being held on December 12 and 13.
"As you are aware, Malta has been in a state of constitutional crisis over the past month because the country’s Prime Minister, Joseph Muscat, has been linked not only to corruption and money laundering but also to the assassination of journalist Daphne Caruana Galizia," the letter says.
Indeed, the Prime Minister’s own Chief of Staff, Keith Schembri, is being implicated in the plotting of the assassination of Daphne Caruana Galizia in a bid to stop her from uncovering the web of corruption in the Prime Minister’s Office, Occupy Justice says.
"Therefore, the Prime Minister Joseph Muscat, is, as a minimum politically responsible for this state-sponsored assassination, and yet he hangs on to power, with the clear intentions of obstructing justice.
"The European Parliament’s Civil Liberties Committee fact-finding mission in Malta in preliminary conclusions expressed the need for Prime Minister Joseph Muscat to step down with urgency.
"European Commissioner Vera Jourova has also expressed her serious concern about the situation in Malta and indicated that there may be grounds for triggering Article 7.
"We therefore, fail to understand how you, as the President of the European Council, can host a Prime Minister whose hands are tainted with blood.
"We expect the European Union to live up to its own values, listed in Article 2 of the Treaty of the European Union, which include democracy, justice and the rule of law.
Through this letter we call on you and the other Member States of the EU to:
1. To put the desperate situation in Malta on the agenda of the European Council summit.
2. To take a position on the desperate situation in Malta during the summit.
3. To call for the IMMEDIATE resignation of Joseph Muscat as Prime Minister of Malta.
If the European Union does not reach out to help its own when democracy is being threatened, then we truly will start questioning what is the point of the European Union if it does not practice what it preaches, the letter concludes