No Freezing of EU Funds for Bulgaria's Fisheries

Bulgaria's Agriculture Minister Miroslav Naydenov has announced that there was no danger of freezing EU funds for the country's Fisheries. Photo by BGNES

There is no danger of freezing EU funding for Bulgaria's Fisheries, the Bulgarian Agriculture Minister has announced.

Minister Miroslav Naydenov has met with the EU Commissioner for Maritime Affairs and Fisheries, Maria Damanaki, to discuss the decision of the European Commission to forbid Bulgaria's access to the so-called “interim payments”, which are a major part of the funds provided under the program, until it is decided which institution in the country will be performing the audits for the payments.

Bulgaria is expecting EU funding amounting to EUR 80 M for its Fisheries until 2013. However, the country still has not received a conformity assessment by Brussels. According to the minister, this problem will be solved soon and EU funding will not be frozen.

“There was no drama. They accepted with admiration the decision that the Parliament has made to redirect the auditing from the Agriculture Ministry to the Financial Ministry. Since this was their decision too, we will transfer the conformity assessment to the EC,” Naydenov said and added that the agreed deadline would be the end of September or the first 10 days of October the latest.

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