Airbus has established an independent panel composed of external consultants from Germany, France and the UK to review its compliance of anti-bribery laws, the company announced Monday. The move comes as authorities from the three countries continue their investigations of allegations of fraud, bribery and corruption at Airbus’s civil aviation business. Those probes effectively cut off Airbus’s access to export credit finance until they close. Export credit accounted for some 6 percent of funding for Airbus airliners in 2015 and, due to the investigation, virtually none last year.
The UK Serious Fraud Office (SFO) launched the criminal investigation last August, some four months after it began looking into the manufacturer’s failure to reveal the identity of some intermediaries in applications for export credit financing for certain airline customers. France’s Parquet National Financier joined the investigation in March.

The compliance panel consists of Lord Gold, a Conservative life peer in the House of Lords and veteran UK lawyer who reviewed Rolls-Royce’s global anti-corruption compliance policies following bribery allegations in various countries; Noëlle Lenoir, French Minister of European Affairs from 2002 to 2004 and a member of the Conseil d’Etat (France’s highest court in administrative and tax matters) since 1984; and Theodor Waigel, the Federal Minister of Finance of Germany in the Cabinet of Chancellor Helmut Kohl from 1989 to 1998 and member of the Bundestag from 1972 to 2002. Waigel has advised corporations and government on matters of compensation, governance and compliance since 1999. From 2009 to 2012, he served as an outside compliance monitor for Siemens.

“Airbus has been building up and improving its compliance process, policies and organization constantly over the past decade,” said Airbus CEO Tom Enders in a statement released on May 22. “A year ago we self-disclosed to the authorities misstatements and omissions that we had found. We have been cooperating fully with the investigations that ensued and further improving our compliance system is obviously our number one priority now. However, to embed irreproachable behaviors in all our business undertakings sustainably, we must take a hard look at both our systems and our culture. That’s why we have chosen to elect highly experienced independent experts to challenge and guide us going forward.”