Taking into account that many projects have faced delays in implementation of the planned activities due to the delays related to the COVID-19 restrictions, and to ensure reaching of the planned project results at the highest quality, the Programme’s Monitoring Committee has approved amendments of the Programme Manuals (PM) for all three calls of the Programme (Programme Manual for the 1st Call for Proposals and Direct Award, 2nd Call for Proposals and 3rd Call for Proposals during the meeting of the Monitoring Committee on 22 October related to the duration of the projects.

Ministry of Environmental Protection and Regional Development of the Republic of Latvia as Financial control of the Programme in Latvia has published updated “Guidelines for Beneficiaries for Proper Financial Management of the European Structural and Investment Funds Objective” European Territorial Cooperation” for the Programme.

On 7 September 2020 the European Commission approved changes of the Latvia-Lithuania Programme document. Due to existing demand, over 2,5 mln. EUR were reallocated for the cross-border cooperation projects contributing to the sustainable and clean environment (priority No. 1 of the Programme) from funds for improvement of the efficiency of the public services (priority No. 4).

Although the EU programming period of the 2014-2020 comes to the end, this does not mean that the cross border cooperation will stop with the implementation of the funded projects and completion of the life cycle of the Interreg V-A Latvia – Lithuania Programme 2014-2020. Both, Latvia and Lithuania, have expressed strong interest in continuation of this type of cooperation among cross-border regions and started process of the development of the new Latvia – Lithuania Cross-Border Cooperation Programme for the period of 2021 – 2027 (Programme 2021-2027) already at the end of last year.