For Romanian media and civil society, which
\nadvocate morality in the public space and the severe punishment of a political
\nclass blamed for robbing the country for almost three decades, the fight
\nagainst corruption is crucial, while magistrates are seen as the knights of
\njustice. For the tens of top-level politicians, from former prime ministers and
\nministers to MPs and mayors, both on the right and left of the political
\nspectrum, from the government and the opposition, from Bucharest and the
\nprovinces, who have found themselves behind bars or at least in the defendants’
\nbox, today’s Romania is a police state or a republic of prosecutors. <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
The debate over
\nwhere the fight against corruption ends and where the violation of human rights
\nbegins has been going on for a few years and is periodically re-ignited
\nwhenever one of the two sides gets new ammunition. <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
The most recent
\nsuch debate was sparked over the archive of the former secret service of the
\njustice ministry. Known as the Independent Service for Protection and
\nAnticorruption, it was established in the early 1990s, soon after the fall of
\ncommunism, and existed until 2006, when it was dismantled amid accusations of
\nabuse. In the meantime, however, it is believed to have collected compromising
\ninformation about magistrates. Some of the files are said to have been stolen
\nor copied and now used to blackmail prosecutors and magistrates into opening
\ncertain investigations and passing certain sentences. The plot has thickened
\nafter accusations that many of these files were acquired straight from the
\nSecuritate, the former political police of the communist regime. <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
On Wednesday, justice
\nminister Tudorel Toader said that, in order to put an end to speculations, the
\ninfamous archive would be declassified as soon as possible. He pointed out,
\nhowever, that his ministry and the government can only declassify files that
\nfall within their prerogatives, while possible state secrets stored in the
\narchive have a different regimen. Prime minister Sorin Grindeanu also weighed
\nin, saying it is important to remove any doubts concerning the judiciary and
\nthat he is in favour of declassifying the archives in keeping with the law. The
\nmove is supported by the magistrates’ associations and by president Klaus
\nIohannis, who added, however, that it would be interesting to find out how this
\nsubject has resurfaced again more than ten years after the dismantling of the
\nIndependent Service for Protection and Anticorruption. <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
\nAnother scandal broke out recently after an
\nInternet post by university professor and doctor in constitutional law Radu
\nChirita saying that in the last five years, state institutions in Romania have
\nmade almost 110,000 requests for phone taps, of which more than 100,000 have
\nbeen approved. He claims 300,000 Romanians have had their phones tapped as a
\nresult. Given that Romania has around 20 million inhabitants, the figure is
\nalmost unbelievable and threatens to deepen the generalised suspiciousness in
\nRomania society. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The debate over where the anti-corruption fight ends and where the violation of human rights begins has re-ignited in Romania.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":105,"featured_media":72978,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[37738],"tags":[28950],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-73499","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-today-in-the-news","tag-corruption"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n