Former SAPARD Director Gheorghita Corbu about EU decision to withdraw funds: " the 13.9 million euro are currently being recovered by the EU" / Former Agriculture minister Dacian Ciolos: "the initial sum was set at 21 million euro"

Former SAPARD director in 2004 – 2005, Gheorghita Corbu declared for HotNews.ro – EurActiv. ro that there were several problems that lead to the decision of the EU to block the 14 million euro from the SAPARD program. At his turn, former Romanian Agriculture minister, Dacian Ciolos declared for HotNews.ro – EurActiv.ro that the sum was initially set at 21 million euro.

Corbu confirmed that at the time there were several problems discovered like conflict of interest among parties in the files and inconsistencies in tender procedures. He declared that the 13.9 million euro are currently being recovered. Moreover, he assured that the state budget will not be affected.

SAPARD’s current director could not be contacted to comment on today’s decision of the Commission to withdraw almost 14 million euro from the SAPARD program. Apart from this sum, there are another 200 million euro for which the Commission did not take any decision at the moment.