Kazatsay said payments might be resumed in December if the audit due in November reveals Romania has fixed all flaws in managing the program. He also said the Commission will start the audit process as soon as Romanian authorities submit a report in this respect.
Kazatsay added the standard procedure requires all projects be double checked. According to Kazatsay, the situation in Romania is not so different from the situation caused by the economic crisis worldwide.
Razvan Cotovelea, state secretary within Romania’s Ministry of European Affairs, on Friday said the Romanian Government will start making payments for refund requests within the HR development program next week and the money will come from the state budget. Cotovelea said the government allocated EUR110 million in state budget funds targeting refund requests for over 1,000 beneficiaries. He also said the money was already transferred to the Labor Ministry to start making payments.
European Affairs Minister Leonard Orban has recently said that paying the money from the state budget, via the education and labor ministries, is the only solution for POSDRU beneficiaries facing severe problems over the suspension of payments by the Commission.
On February 20, Romania’s Ministry of European Affairs received an official notice from the Commission, announcing the interruption of payments for the HR development program. The Commission’s Directorate General for Employment, Social Affairs and Inclusion (DG EMPL) stated problems found by the Romanian Audit Authority are associated with project selection and first-level verification procedures. As a result, the Commission decided to stop sending refunds to Romania for up to six months.