The Commission, the European Union's executive arm, is responsible for upholding EU law. It had already once launched proceedings against Greece for unreliable deficit statistics in 2004, but closed them in 2007. "There will probably be another infringement procedure... because providing timely and reliable statistics is an obligation under EU law and they have failed in their obligation," the EU source said. Greece revised its 2008 budget deficit to 7.7 percent of gross domestic product from 5.0 percent reported in April and also revised its 2009 budget deficit forecast to more than 12 percent of GDP from 3.7 percent forecast in April.
"There will probably be another infringement procedure... because providing timely and reliable statistics is an obligation under EU law and they have failed in their obligation," the EU source said.
Greece revised its 2008 budget deficit to 7.7 percent of gross domestic product from 5.0 percent reported in April and also revised its 2009 budget deficit forecast to more than 12 percent of GDP from 3.7 percent forecast in April.
"The fact that Eurostat has not validated those figures does not necessarily imply that the final figures will be higher. It simply means that Eurostat at this stage is not capable of validating the figures," Commission spokeswoman Amelia Torres said.
