Court of Auditors
Set up in Luxembourg in 1977 to audit the EU finances. Composed of one member from each member state and appointed by a qualified majority already under the Treaty of Nice. The current rules can be found in Art. 285 - 287 TFEU of the Lisbon Treaty.
The Court publishes a substantial report, which has made increasingly stronger complaints about fraud and mal-administration within the EU. Since 1994, the Court of Auditors has refused to accept the validity of the underlying financial transactions in EU.
In 2008 the Court of Auditors gave the first approval of the accounts – but making the same criticisms as before.
Commission bookkeeping has also been criticised by the auditors and by whistleblower Marta Andreasen. She was head of the Commission's accounts department and was fired after her criticism of the bookkeeping system.
Links
See Andreasen regarding the EU accounts and Censure and Buitenen regarding the events leading to the fall of the EU Commission on the 15 March 1999.