Brussels, 29/03/2012 (Agence Europe) - On Thursday 29 March, the General Court of the EU annulled the decision of the Commission requiring the new member states to pay financial amounts linked to the elimination of surpluses of agricultural products existing within their territory at the date of their accession to the European Union. Such a payment to the Community budget is contrary to the Act of Accession of those states, according to rulings in several similar cases.
According to the 2003 Act of Accession, all the surpluses - private or public - had to be eliminated, at the expense of the new member states and the Commission had to make the necessary arrangements. In 2007, the Commission adopted a decision in which it quantified the surpluses existing within the territories of the new member states on 1 May 2004 and set out the financial amounts to be imposed on those states “in consequence of the expense of elimination” (€12.4 million for Poland, €3.6 million for Slovakia, €12.2 million for the Czech Republic and €3.1 million for Lithuania). These four countries subsequently brought an action for annulment of that decision. The Court concluded that the financial amounts referred to by the contested decision “are not financial contributions envisaged by the Act of Accession to cover the costs of eliminating the surpluses, but straightforward payments imposed on the new member states for the benefit of the Community”. (LC/transl.rt)