On Monday 15 January, the European Commission paid Hungary the sum of €140.1 million, corresponding to the balance of the pre-financing to which Budapest is entitled under the ‘REPowerEU’ chapter of its post-Covid-19 national recovery plan.
This package is in addition to an initial payment, at the end of 2023, of €779.5 million to finance reforms and investments aimed at accelerating the reduction of the European Union’s dependence on Russian hydrocarbons (see EUROPE 13321/12).
Apart from these pre-financing payments, no other payments will be made to Hungary until it has reached the ‘milestones’ set out in its €10.4 billion recovery plan, including €3.9 billion in loans (see EUROPE 13299/28).
BYD. When asked about the fact that European funds allocated to the Hungarian recovery plan will benefit the Chinese electric vehicle manufacturer BYD, a spokeswoman for the European Commission, Veerle Nuyts, pointed out that the checks carried out on recovery plans aim to measure “performance” and are not interested in the nature of the “final beneficiaries”. (Original version in French by Mathieu Bion)