Philip Blenkinsop

BRUSSELS, (Reuters) – Wednesday’s court case against Wizz Air in Hungary for 36.66M Euros ($38.60 Million) in rescue money received by TAROM during the COVID-19 pandemic was lost. The EU competition regulators cleared Wizz Air.

The General Court of the European Union is the EU’s second highest legal court. It affirmed the European Commission’s acceptance of the 2020 state aid.

It stated that the aid was compliant with EU internal markets rules because it aimed at preventing social hardships caused by disruption to TAROM service for connectivity between regions of Romania.

Romania revealed to the commission its aid in February 2020. This included a loan for TAROM’s liquidity, repayable six months later. In the same month, the commission also approved the aid.

Wizz Air attempted to overturn this decision by arguing that aid did not meet two conditions: that it contributes to an objective common interest, and that rescue assistance should have been denied to the company before.

EU Court stated that an objective in common interest was to avoid social hardship or market failure. This is what the Commission sought, given the state of Romanian rail and road infrastructure.

The TAROM stated that additional aid can be granted if a minimum of 10 years have passed since the previous restructuring, and this was true for TAROM.

($1 = 0.9498 euros)