PM Boc: Budget cuts will not affect absorption of European funds

The budget cuts will not affect the co-financing funds made available by Romania for the absorption of European funds, Prime Minister Emil Boc said on Thursday at the beginning of a meeting of the Inter-ministerial board on European fund absorption, where also attending was European Commissioner for Regional Policy Johannes Hahn.

'The budget decisions we have taken, those national decisions to narrow the Government deficit, will in now way affect the financial resources earmarked for co-financing European projects. On the contrary, the budgetary adjustments we have made and we will make keep intact the public financial resources for the absorption of European funds starting from the idea that our priority of bringing money to Romania to modernise the country and for regional development has to materialise,' Boc told Hahn.

He informed Hahn that by May 31, 2010, 17,292 projects had been submitted for European financing under seven operational programmes.

According to data with the Romanian Government, 4,342 of the submitted projects were approved and 2,664 signed for financing

Agerpres