The Romanian Justice Minister Tudorel Toader says he will
\norder an independent audit of the Prosecutor’s Office with the High Court of
\nCassation and Justice, the Anticorruption Directorate (DNA), and the
\nDirectorate for the Investigation of Organised Crime and Terrorism (DIICOT) to
\nassess the prosecutors’ activity. The examination will look into the number of
\ncases each prosecutor is working on, the deadlines for solving them, the number
\nof cases brought to the attention of the European Court of Human Rights and the
\nnumber of people imprisoned unjustly. <\/p>\n
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The Minister’s decision to initiate an independent audit
\ncomes shortly after the evaluation of the activity of Prosecutor General
\nAugustin Lazar and of anticorruption chief-prosecutor Laura Codruta Kovesi. The
\ndecision to evaluate them was triggered by a recent ruling of the
\nConstitutional Court according to which the DNA overstepped its responsibilities when investigating the
\nissuing of a controversial decree relaxing anti-corruption criminal laws
\nby the government made up of the Social Democratic Party and the Alliance of
\nLiberals and Democrats. After the evaluation of the two chief prosecutors,
\nminister Tudorel Toader has explained that the Constitutional Court’s ruling,
\naccording to which there is a conflict between the state powers, does not
\ninvolve penalties, so replacing the two chief prosecutors is not opportune. I
\nmade that evaluation in keeping with article 132 of the Constitution, as I also
\nbelieved there was a problem, but I did not forget that Law 303 allows the
\nevaluation of prosecutors on merits. So I will order an independent audit not
\nonly of the DNA and the Prosecutor General’s Office, but also of the DIICOT,
\nbecause all of Romania’s 2,650 prosecutors are employed by the Public Ministry.
\nIt would be unfair to evaluate only some of them and not the others, the
\nminister said. <\/p>\n
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DIICOT chief-prosecutor Daniel Horodniceanu believes the
\nJustice Minister’s initiative is a natural move: <\/p>\n
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It’s natural for the Public Ministry to be treated as a
\nunitary structure. On the other hand, DIICOT has not been subject to
\nmonitorisation under the Cooperation and Verification Mechanism or the previous
\nevaluation of the Justice Minister. However, if the Justice Minister wants to
\nevaluate the entire activity of the Public Ministry, then of course the DIICOT,
\nas one of the Public Ministry’s bodies, will also be evaluated alongside the
\nDNA and the Prosecutor’s Office with the High Court of Cassation and Justice
\nand their subordinated bodies. <\/p>\n
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Prime minister Sorin Grindeanu says his primary concern is
\nthe functioning of the rule of law, and that for this to happen it is important
\nfor the institutions to be strong and the institutional mechanisms to function
\nproperly and be defined clearly, irrespective of who is at their helm.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
In Bucharest, the Justice Minister announced he would order an independent audit of the General Prosecutors Office, the National Anti-Corruption Directorate and Directorate for the Investigation of Organised Crime and Terrorism.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":108,"featured_media":72890,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[37738],"tags":[38903],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-72975","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-today-in-the-news","tag-public-prosecutors-audit"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n