Belgian justice has opened an investigation to establish possible responsibilities within the Kinder chocolate factory (Ferrero group) located in Arlon, at the origin of cases of salmonellosis in several European countries, announced on Monday the public prosecutor's office of the province of Luxembourg (south).
“I confirm the opening of a judicial investigation,” said Anne-Sophie Gilmot, spokesperson for the prosecution, in a press release, without specifying which facts were targeted.
"The company has seen its authorization withdrawn, it is now up to the courts to conduct its investigation," said Jean-Sébastien Wahlin, of the Federal Agency for the Safety of the Food Chain (Afsca).
The Afsca had forced this production site of the Italian confectionery giant Ferrero to cease its activity on Friday.
In question: its lack of transparency on an incident that occurred in mid-December which caused contamination with salmonella of products from the Kinder range.
This supervisory authority pointed to the "incomplete" information provided by Ferrero after the incident, ordering the recall by the manufacturer of all Kinder products from the site.
The Italian giant, known for Kinder chocolate eggs but also Nutella spread, acknowledged “internal failures” which led to “delays in retrieving and sharing information within the time limits”.
“The Arlon plant represents approximately 7% of the total volume of Kinder products manufactured worldwide over one year,” he pointed out.
Its employees, on leave this week, could then have to be placed on temporary unemployment.
The site currently employs about 900 people on average over the year, a figure which fluctuates according to the seasons, according to a union source.
More than a "hundred cases" in Europe
According to Afsca, "more than a hundred cases of salmonellosis have been identified in Europe" for several weeks, and the link established at the end of March between these poisonings and the Ferrero factory in Arlon "has been confirmed since then".
The Afsca explained that it had been alerted by the British authorities who suspected the Belgian Ferrero site of being the source of the poisoning, which the company confirmed.
Read also“How come the company did not report the problem sooner?”
Last Tuesday, a spokesperson for the British authorities told AFP that they had recorded 63 cases of salmonella contamination in the United Kingdom.
Twenty cases have also been identified in France.
No deaths have been reported.
Salmonellosis, caused by bacteria called salmonella, is a leading cause of death from food poisoning.
Its symptoms appear on average after one to three days of incubation.
They are most often those of sometimes acute gastroenteritis: diarrhea and abdominal cramps, slight fever, even vomiting.