Romania lost almost 14 million euro of EU SAPARD funds

The European Commission decided to cease the payment of 13.9 billion euro in May, through its SAPARD program for 2003-2005 due to inconsistencies in complying with SAPARD regulations, EC Commissioner on Agriculture spokesperson Michael Mann declared after a HotNews.ro inquiry.

The decision was taken after a thorough analysis of the action plan of the Romanian authorities and an audit report on SAPARD payments, documents that Romanian authorities sent to the Commission after the latter froze almost 200 million euro in June 2008.

The Commission declared that authorities failed to check feasibility projects for rural development projects and that they did not present enough information from their on site controls. Therefore, the Commission decided to cease the payment of 13,9 billion euro.

Mann declared that the Commission is still checking the SAPARD program in Romania and that it did not reach a decision regarding the rest of the money.