Brussels, 15/03/2012 (Agence Europe) - At the meeting in Brussels on Thursday 15 March of President of the European Commission José Manuel Barroso and new Romanian Prime Minister Mihai-Razvan Ungureanu, the two men discussed the economy, implementation of the IMF-EU aid package, improving the use of EU Structural Funds in Romania and the future of the Cooperation and Verification Mechanism (CVM).
Taking over from Emil Boc, Ungureanu wanted to assure the EU that Romania will respect the terms and conditions for the financial aid it has been receiving since 2009 from the IMF and the EU. Bucharest was initially granted €20 billion for 2009-2011, followed by another €5bn on condition that it applies a strict austerity package. On Thursday, Barroso welcomed the fact that the new prime minister had promised to meet all the budget targets set for 2012, saying that the aid programme was on track, and commenting: “It is important that this agenda is followed closely and that the uneven progress made in areas like the energy sector, state-owned companies and the healthcare sector is quickly addressed. We discussed the specific issue of youth unemployment. Education is a strategy area for funding for future growth, and I asked the prime minister to look again at budget allocations and how his government can reduce the number of teenagers leaving school early.” Ungureanu asked the Commission for practical aid to help his country better absorb EU Structural Funds (the absorption rate is currently only 7.4%).
The CVM for the Schengen area is an extremely sensitive issue for Romania because the CVM is used by Schengen countries to impose conditions to be met by Romania before it is allowed to join Schengen. Barroso said: “The Commission will reject any attempts to link the mechanism to the Schengen accession process. This is a question of fairness.” Ungureanu made the trip to Brussels to call for an end to the CVM, and said he was confident that all the arguments in favour of getting rid of the CVM would be handed to the Commission in July in a bid to remove it. Like Bulgaria, since 2007 Romania has been subject to close monitoring by the Commission of its judicial system and how the country is tackling corruption. In July this year, the Commission is due to publish a progress report on five years of operation of the CVM. Barroso said it was too early to say whether or not the Commission would scrap the CVM for Romania and Bulgaria, pointing out that it would base its decision on an objective analysis of work on the ground, and on sustainable and irreversible progress in Romania. (SP/transl.fl)