February 9 (SeeNews) - Serbia's infrastructure ministry said that Greek civil engineering group Aktor's plan to catch up on delays in the construction of parts of Nis-Dimitrovgrad motorway is unsatisfactory.
According to the supervision and engineering experts at the ministry, the plan is unrealistic and does not comply with the contractual obligations of Aktor, the ministry said in a statement on Wednesday after infrastructure minister Zorana Mihajlovic met with Aktor executive director Dimitrios Koutras to present an analysis of the plan proposed by the Greek company.
Last week, the Serbian government said it planned to complete the analysis by February 8 before deciding how to proceed with construction works on the project and possibly terminate the contracts for some of the four sections awarded to Aktor.
"Aktor is not a small firm, it works everywhere in the region, but apparently has financial problems and has not hired enough workers to complete the construction, and relocates workers from one place to another. It has completed a little more than half of the 48 km stretch it is working on," local news agency Beta quoted Mihajlovic as saying last week.
The Greek company is building the Prosek-Crvena Reka, Crvena Reka-Ciflik, Stanicenje-Pirot sections and Dimitrovgrad bypass of the Nis-Dimitrovgrad motorway, part of pan-European Corridor X. Aktor is in charge of building two of three lots of the Prosek-Crvena Reka sections in consortium with Italian sector player Terna. In the Dimitrovgrad bypass project, Aktor is also executing two of three lots.
All of the sections, except for Lot 2 of Prosek-Crvena Reka, had to be completed by the end of 2016.
Corridor X is projected to connect Salzburg in Austria to the Greek port of Thessaloniki, passing through Slovenia, Croatia, Serbia and Macedonia.