EC Warns Against Reversing Recovery Plan Milestones Already Deemed Fulfilled

Bratislava, 30 August (TASR) - Thanks to the Recovery and Resilience Plan, Slovakia received €6.4 billion from the European Union to strengthen and modernise its economy, but the disbursement of these funds is tied to meeting the national plan of milestones and targets, with the deadline falling on 31 August of this year, TASR was told by Katarina Touquet Jaremova from the European Commission (EC) Representation in Slovakia on Sunday. Final payments under the Recovery and Resilience Plan must be made no later than 31 December of this year. At the same time, in order to avoid suspended or reduced payments, EC is also warning against reversing milestones and targets that have already been assessed as satisfactorily completed. "In terms of volume, the Recovery and Resilience Facility accounts for more than five percent of Slovakia's GDP and is now entering the final stretch. All of its milestones and targets must be met by this Monday. Since the approval of the recovery plan in 2021, the EC has remained in close contact with Slovak partners to help them utilise these unique European funds as efficiently as possible for meaningful reforms and investments benefitting this country and its people," explained head of the EC Representation in Slovakia Peter Stano. According to him, the EC subsequently assessed compliance with the set and agreed milestones and targets by Slovak authorities and approved the release of payments for individual stages of the recovery plan. "A responsible and thorough implementation of the recovery plan remains fully in the hands of the Slovak government and will be crucial for modernising both Slovakia and the entire EU," said Stano, adding that Slovakia has already submitted all payment requests under the Recovery and Resilience Plan to the EC. The EC is currently evaluating Slovakia's eighth and ninth payment requests, which could bring in the remaining €1.2 billion from the overall package. This will entail meeting 83 milestones and targets, such as important reforms in education and the environment, as well as major investment projects, for instance in health-care and digitalisation. Touquet Jaremova explained that the funds from the recovery plan represent a grant for Slovakia from EU's resources, not a loan. According to her, these European investments have helped finance the construction of kindergartens, building insulation projects, supercomputers, the construction of two key hospitals in Martin (Zilina region) and Banska Bystrica, and many other projects for which the state lacked funding or could not allocate its national resources. jrg