Romania wants to be the same as Euro-zone countries to have easier access to EU funding and will ask EU authorities to relax the Maastricht criteria, President Traian Basescu said yesterday (Thurs)
Basescu said:
"I want to talk with the European Commission and see at the next European Council meeting to what extent we can relax the Maastricht criteria during these difficult times".
"I don't want to offend anyone or to point fingers, but there are several Euro-zone countries that are not meeting the criteria".
Basescu explained that Romania was faced with tough budget constraints because of the Maastricht criteria, which endanger the country's plan to join the Euro zone by 2015 and make it hard for the country to get money from the European Union or the European Investment Bank (EIB) because it would have to make its own financial contribution to any project to be funded by the European Union.
Romanian Times
