The State Chancellery comments on the results of the audit of Kariņas’ special flights by the State Audit Office

TVNET already reported that illegal and uneconomical behavior in organizing the special flights of former Prime Minister Krišjānis Kariņš (JV) caused a total of around 545,000 euros of unjustified expenses for the budgets of Latvia and the Council of the European Union (EU), the State Audit Office (VK) found in the audit.

The State Audit Office believes that by using special flights even in cases where the state of emergency had not been declared and when alternatives to regular commercial flights were available in a reasonable time, illegal behavior with state budget funds has been allowed, which has resulted in additional state budget expenses of at least 221,566 euros. On the other hand, according to the estimates of the State Audit Office, the allowed non-economic behavior caused additional expenses of at least 323,688 euros for the Council of the EU.

“Thus, the law on the prevention of wastage of financial resources and property of a public person has not been observed,” assesses VK and notes that the financial audit also found violations of regulatory acts related to the organization of public procurement and accounting.

According to the State Audit Office, the information obtained during the audit shows that both the then Prime Minister Kariņš and the Prime Minister’s Office and the State Chancellery under his direct authority were actually involved in the decision-making and implementation of the use of special flights on foreign missions. At that time, the Prime Minister’s office was headed by the current member of the Saeima, Jānis Patmalnieks (JV), while the State Chancellery is headed by Jānis Citskovskis.

In the opinion of the State Audit Office, the responsibility of all involved persons for the decisions made to use special flights must be assessed. At the same time, the State Audit Office points out that it is not possible to identify specific responsible persons who made decisions about the use of special flights during the foreign business trips of the Prime Minister and the delegation using audit methods.