{
  "url": "https://openlegislation.uk/eu-decision-2004-658/annex/article-6",
  "json_url": "https://openlegislation.uk/eu-decision-2004-658/annex/article-6.json",
  "legislation": "eudn/2004/658",
  "legislation_title": "Council Decision 2004/658/CFSP of 13 September 2004 on the financial provisions applicable to the general budget of the European Defence Agency",
  "legislation_url": "https://openlegislation.uk/eu-decision-2004-658",
  "path": "annex/article/6",
  "kind": "article",
  "number": "6",
  "heading": null,
  "text": "1. Initiation of an operation shall mean all the operations which are normally carried out by the staff referred to in Article 5(4) and (5) and which are preparatory to the adoption of the acts implementing the budget by the competent authorising officer, by delegation or subdelegation.\n2. Ex ante verification of an operation shall mean all the ex ante checks put in place by the authorising officer responsible by delegation or subdelegation in order to verify its operational and financial aspects.\n3. Each operation shall be subject at least to an ex ante verification. The purpose of that verification shall be to ascertain that:\n(a) the expenditure and revenue are in order and comply with the provisions applicable, in particular those of the budget and the relevant regulations and of any acts adopted in implementation of the Treaties, the legislation applicable and, where appropriate, the terms of contracts;\n(b) the principle of sound financial management is applied.\n4. The ex post verifications on documents and, where appropriate, on the spot shall check that operations financed by the budget are correctly implemented and in particular that the criteria referred to in paragraph 3 are complied with. These verifications may be organised on a sample basis using risk analysis.\n5. The officials or other staff responsible for the verifications referred to in paragraphs 2 and 4 shall be different from those performing the tasks of initiation referred to in paragraph 1 and shall not be their subordinates.",
  "extent": "E+W+S+N.I.",
  "status": null,
  "version": "current",
  "annotations": [],
  "outstanding_effects": [],
  "provenance": {
    "source": "legislation.gov.uk",
    "source_url": "https://www.legislation.gov.uk/eudn/2004/658/annex/article/6",
    "retrieved_at": "2026-11-01T15:18:07.999539+00:00"
  },
  "licence": "Open Government Licence v3.0",
  "licence_url": "https://www.nationalarchives.gov.uk/doc/open-government-licence/version/3/",
  "attribution": "Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Source: legislation.gov.uk, The National Archives."
}