The European Commission informed Polish government that the EU executive will proceed to executing fines imposed on Poland over Turów mine dispute with the Czech Republic, TVN24 correspondent in Brussels Maciej Sokołowski reported on Tuesday. The sum for the first month of unpaid penalties, in the amount of 15 million eurios, is to be deducted from EU funds for Poland in 10 days.
The dispute over Turów lignite mine between Poland and Czech Republic began in late February 2021, when Prague filed a complaint against Poland and demanded operations at the mine be stopped. In May, the Court of Justice of the EU imposed interim measures on Poland, including an order to immediately cease to extract lignite in Turów. Poland ignored the interim measures.
As a result, the EU court ordered Poland to pay the European Commission a daily fine in the amount of 500,000 euros. The daily fines amounted to a total sum of nearly 69 million euros, which is almost 315 million zlotys.
Last week, Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki said that Poland was not planning to pay the fine. "We wil certainly appeal against it" - he stressed.
The leaders of the Czech Republic and Poland agreed a deal last week to end a long-running dispute over expansion at the Turów open-pit lignite mine on the Polish side of the border, a row that reached the European Union's top court.
Poland has paid the agreed compensation in a dispute over Turów mine that lies close to the border with the Czech Republic and Prague has withdrawn its complaint at the Court of Justice of the European Union, the Polish prime minister said on Feb.4.
"The Czech Republic has withdrawn its complaint to European institutions and that is the end of this issue," Polish Prime Minister Mateusz Morawiecki told a news conference, after Poland paid.
Under the deal, the Czech Republic said it would withdraw the legal complaint in exchange for compensation of 45 million euros ($51 million) for infrastructure upgrades and other environmental safeguards and pledges.
Why Poland still has to pay, despite reaching agreement with the Czech Republic? "Charging fines stopped the moment the agreement was reached, but up to that moment daily fines had amassed and now they have to be paid," TVN24 correspondent in Brussels Maciej Sokołowski said.
He added that the fines "were not related to the essence of the dispute, whether Poland or Czech Republic was right". "They were issued because interim measures had been imposed on Poland, which Poland had failed to follow. Hence the decision by the Court of Justice of the EU to issue the fines, and for that same reason the European Commission is trying to recover that money. And because it cannot recover the money directly from the Polish authorities, it's going to get it back by deducting it from EU funding for Poland," TVN24 correspondent explained.
Źródło: TVN24 News in English, TVN24, Reuters