France has been order to pay back €23.15m of EU expenditure on wine, which the European Commission says has been “misspent.”


A Brussels wine spokesman said France had granted aid for “ineligible rectified concentrated must prepared from grape must produced in the Charentes region” which had been used to enrich certain wine products.


Separately, the Commission said, France had provided aid for the production of raw alcohol to producers of spirits distilled from grape marc. In both cases the payments contravened EU legislation covering the compulsory wine distillation scheme.


Brussels said it was moving to recover the money “because of inadequate control procedures or non-compliance with EU rules on agricultural expenditure.”


France, the only EU member country fined under the wine heading, can appeal against the fine if it wishes.

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