The EU is unable to verify with certainty how over €1bn of European taxpayer money was spent on Syrian refugees in Turkey because of Ankara's data protection laws.
"I can say that this is a serious situation," chief European auditor Bettina Jakobsen told reporters in Brussels on Monday (12 November).
"Normally as an auditor you would say you would like to follow the flow of money from the cradle to the grave. And we cannot do that here," she said.
Although money still ended...
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Nikolaj joined EUobserver in 2012 and covers home affairs. He is originally from Denmark, but spent much of his life in France and in Belgium. He was awarded the King Baudouin Foundation grant for investigative journalism in 2010.