The European Commission is about to launch the excessive deficit procedures against Romania, a situation that implies a careful monitoring of all budget income and payments, as well as financial sanctions, sources in Brussels said for HotNews.ro. According to the sources, Romanian officials have been warned by the European Economic and Monetary Affairs Commissioner, Joaquin Almunia, that the launching of the procedures is inevitable. European Commissioner Leonard Orban, representing Romania, recently warned that the lack of corrections in budgetary policies will lead to the launching of such procedures at the beginning of May.

"It s a serious signal concerning the lack of confidence in the Government in office, mainly due to the repeatedly offering of inconsistent economic data to the European Commission. From now on, it is only a matter of European procedures, which take time", the HotNews.ro sources said.

The EC may launch the excessive deficit procedure in case the budget deficit is above 3%. At the middle of January, Finance Minister Gheorghe Pogea said that the 2008 deficit was 5.2%, while the target set for this year is 2.7% of the GDP.