As Poslovni Dnevnik writes, the European Commission (EC) has stated that when it comes to Croatian EU fund absorption, more precisely money from the Solidarity Fund, it will be sympathetic towards the circumstances surrounding it.
Those of us living in the City of Zagreb and who remember the earthquake happening and the sheer amount of time it took for any sort of real clean up to begin will have a particular understanding of the circumstances that have caused the Prime Minister to request an extension. Many obstacles, mainly in the form of paperwork and a slow administration which wasn’t helped by the pandemic continue to exist on the road to post-earthquake recovery, particularly in Sisak-Moslavina County following December 2020’s horrific earthquake.
“Glad to meet with Andrej Plenkovic today. We discussed reconstruction work supported by the European Union after the Zagreb and Petrinja earthquakes. Given the exceptional circumstances, the Commission will look favourably at the request to align deadlines for absorption of EUSF funds to June 2023,” she wrote on her Twitter.
Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic also took to Twitter and spoke about the meeting.
“Following the arguments presented by Ursula von der Leyen, the European Commission will approve the use of EUSF funds to repair the damage from the Zagreb earthquake until June 2023, which is in line with the period for the use of the Banovina earthquake allocation (of funds) due to progressive damage,” he wrote in his own tweet.
For more on Croatia and the EU, as well as Croatian EU fund use across various sectors, make sure to check out our dedicated politics section.
