EC to reimburse EUR 260 million to Romania

Newsroom 23/04/2013 | 10:42

Payments for the Regional Operational Programme 2007-2013 (ROP) will be reimbursed to Romania according to the Ministry of Regional Development and Public Administration (MRDPA), which received the official information from the European Commission (EC).

Practically, EC will reimburse Romania funds in amount of EUR 260 million, for payments made by the Romanian state for ROP beneficiaries. Romania was in a period of suspension, from October 2010 until now. The decision was taken as a result of the adjustment measures for the programme management system applied at the level of the MRDPA and other Romanian institutions.

The new audit applied to the programme after the implementation of the measures revealed that the management and control of the ROP works and needs minor improvements. In addition, the ROP-MA accepted the 10% flat-rate correction imposed on public procurement launched before 1 October 2011, within the priority axes 1, 3 and 5, GD no. 1160/2012 having been adopted in this sense.

Besides these ROP specific measures, the EC had also identified that the ex-ante verification system of conflict of interest from the Unit for Coordination and Verification of Public Procurement (UCVAP) was not appropriate, requesting the Romanian authorities to solve this problem. In this regard, GD 925/2006 was amended, thus strengthening the responsibilities of the UCVAP.

Oana Vasiliu