The European Commission has decided to refer Greece to the Court of Justice of the European Union for failing to comply with a 2017 ruling by the Court of Justice.
In its ruling, the Court had condemned Greece for failure to implement a 2014 Commission decision requiringit torecover €135.8 million of incompatible aid from Larco General Mining and Metallurgical Company.
In March 2014, the Commission found that various public measures (in the form of capital injections and state guarantees) in favour of Larco gave the company an undue advantage over its competitors, in breach of EU State aid rules.
The Commission ordered Greece to recover the incompatible State aid amounting to €135.8 million, plus interest.
On the same date, the Commission also adopted a decision finding that a plan proposed by Greece for the sale of certain assets of Larco could be implemented without the buyer being liable to repay any of the incompatible State aid granted to Larco.
The sale plan has not yet been implemented.
In November 2017, the Court of Justice found that Greece had failed to implement the Commission's 2014 recovery decision and condemned Greece for not having recovered the incompatible State aid, as required by the 2014 recovery decision.
In January 2019, the Commission sent a letter of formal notice to Greece regarding the non-implementation of the 2017 Court's ruling.
To this date, more than five years after the adoption of the Commission decision and following the Court's judgment and the Commission's letter of formal notice, Greece has still not recovered the incompatible State aid from Larco.
The Commission has therefore now requested the Court of Justice to impose on Greece the following financial sanctions:
- A lump sum payment of approximately € 3 709 per day for the period between 9 November 2017 (date of the first ruling by the Court of Justice) and the date Greece complies with the Court's ruling, or, alternatively, failing compliance, the date of delivery of the Court's second ruling.
The minimum lump sum payment should not be lower than € 1.3 million.
- A daily penalty payment of approximately € 26 697 from the day of its judgment until the date Greece brings the infringement to an end.
An appeal by Larco against that judgment is currently pending before the Court of Justice. ■