National road builder is paid extra to get job done in time

Aegean Motorway, the highway construction and operation consortium that the Infrastructure Ministry had said would not get any fresh funds given that its project (on the Athens-Thessaloniki national road) was advanced enough, is after all recieving additional money set to total tens of millions of euros.

Kathimerini can reveal a secret agreement between the ministry and the consortium for the payment of 41.9 million euros as well as the concession of a series of studies and projects so that Aegean agrees to complete the tunnels at Tempi and Platamonas by the end of March.

With this additional cash, the project will have cost the state and the European Union more than 1 billion euros.

The "Agreement for the Completion of the Maliakos-Klidi Highway" was signed on January 17 by minister Christos Spirtzis and the representatives of the consortium. Its aim is none...