Though disliked by many,
\nthe Constitutional Court remains the implacable arbiter of Romanian political
\nlife. In casual terms, its decisions, even if debated, are enforced. On
\nWednesday, it was the turn of the opposition in the Romanian Parliament to
\ncomply with its rule and swallow the bitter pill of referrals rejected by the
\njudges of the Court. Both the Save Romania Union (USR, center-right) and the Alliance for the
\nUnion of Romanians (AUR, nationalist), as well as the Ombudsman had notified
\nthe Court about elements of unconstitutionality regarding the three Justice
\nlaws adopted in the Parliament dominated by the PSD-PNL-UDMR government
\ncoalition.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
However, the Court
\ndecided that the Law on the status of judges and prosecutors, the Law on
\njudicial organization and the Law on the Superior Council of Magistracy are all
\nconstitutional. The interim Speaker of the Senate, the Liberal Alina Gorghiu,
\nwrote on social media that the CCR’s decision was correct and natural, and
\nthe laws will be submitted for promulgation. She believes that, in this way, normality
\nwill be resumed. Alina Gorghiu has stressed that Romania’s goal is, at present,
\nthe lifting of the Cooperation and Verification Mechanism, through which
\nBrussels has been monitoring the functioning of the rule of law in Romania
\nsince its accession to the European Union in 2007. She has also said that Romania’s
\naccession to the Schengen free movement area also depends on removing this
\nmechanism. <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
The procedures regarding
\nthe adoption of the three laws, Alina Gorghiu also claims, were carried out in
\ncoordination with the European Commission, and correcting the justice legislation
\nwas also an objective included in the National Recovery and Resilience Plan, which
\nthe Romanian Government and Brussels agreed upon together. <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
The Save Romania Union,
\nhowever, claims that the new laws will do a lot of harm. According to the
\nformer Justice Minister Stelian Ion, these are extremely bad and harmful laws,
\nwhich take us back to the period before admission to the European Union, when
\nthe authoritarian left-wing regime of Prime Minister Adrian N\u0103stase had tried
\nto subordinate the magistrates and stop the anti-corruption fight.The decision of the
\nConstitutional Court to reject the notifications submitted by the USR, in the
\nabsence of an opinion from the Venice Commission, proves that the CCR has become
\na simple political tool, the former minister also said. <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
In turn, the AUR
\nspokesperson, Dan T\u0103nas\u0103, has said that not sanctioning the judges who do not
\ncomply with the decisions of the CCR renders the decisions devoid of their
\nmandatory nature. The Ombudsman too believes that, in addition to the forms of
\nmanifestation of the right of association, the new legislation in the field
\nforesees an expansion of the area of \u200b\u200bfunctions that can be taken by judges
\nand prosecutors, which exceeds the activity of doing justice. The opposition
\ncalls on President Klaus Iohannis not to
\npromulgate the justice laws in their current form and to wait for the opinion
\nof the Venice Commission. (MI)<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
The new justice laws have passed the test of the Constitutional Court of Romania<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":105,"featured_media":82962,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[37738],"tags":[35770,32472,31841],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-93726","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-today-in-the-news","tag-constitutional-court-of-romania","tag-justice-laws","tag-venice-commission"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n