Brussels, 10/04/2003 (Agence Europe) - The Court of First Instance (CFI) has today confirmed the Commission's decision of July 2000 to recover State aid that has been granted illegally to the US Scott Paper Company (a producer of household and sanitary paper) in August 1987. The aid consisted in preferential conditions to the town of Orléans and the general council of Loiret's sale of 48 hectares in the residential area of Las Saussaye to Scott Paper in exchange for the building of its factory warehouse. Following a complaint, the Commission addressed a letter to France in January 1997 in which for the first time it asked the country for information about this aid. After a number or exchanges of letters, a procedure was opened I on 20 May 1998 as the Commission still harboured doubts about the legality of this aid. On 12 July, following several requests to the French authorities, which still failed to provide complete information, the Commission decided that the aid was illegal. Following this decision, the local authorities, supported by Scott Paper, went to the CFI and argued that recovery of the aid was prescribed by the 10 years limitation rule introduced by the State aid procedural regulation of 1999. According to the limitation rule, the Commission cannot request recovery of aid agree ten years before, without there being a Commission intervention having taken place during this period. According to the applicants, the limitation period expired in August 1997, as it had neither been interrupted by a formal Commission act or by the Commission notifying Scott Paper. The CFI has just rejected this request and points out that a formal request for information sent by the Commission to the Member State concerned interrupts the limitation period. In the present case, the limitation period was therefore interrupted on 17 January 1997 and that the aid still be subject to recovery. The Commission has welcomed this very important decision for policies used for examining state aid, indicated Tilman Lueder, the spokesman for Commissioner Monti.