Korčagins said that State Audit Office examined the economic and legal basis of Kariņš' flights in the audit. The Audit Office will provide more details later on Wednesday.
"We must say we have detected unlawful and uneconomical action during the audit of the special flights [of Krišjānis Kariņš]. [..] The Audit Office has passed the information on the unlawful actions to the Prosecutor General and the Procurement Monitoring Bureau," Korčagins said.
Meanwhile, State Audit Office Board Member Inga Vilka said in an interview with Latvian Television that the audit evaluated the period from the beginning of 2021 until the end of 2023, when the state of emergency declared due to the Covid-19 pandemic was also in effect. Vilka said that during this time there were two persons in the position of Prime Minister. In total, the Prime Minister has made 53 foreign missions, and in 32 cases, special flights have been used. State Audit Office separately assessed flights financed from the national and European budgets.
Vilka said the State Audit Office wanted to dispel the myth that there were urgent flights, pointing out that only one over the entire time had been ordered the day before.
Other flights have been scheduled days in advance, even 37 days before the flight. “Planning could have been done a lot better,” Vilka said.
State Audit will inform the public more about the findings later on Wednesday.
