Live replay of the Plenary Debate on The rule of law in Romania: Statement by Viorica DANCILA, Romanian Prime Minister

Strasbourg

debate

plenary session

EU - Romania (T)

EU mechanism on democracy, the rule of law and fundamental rights (T)

DĂNCILĂ, Viorica (S&D, RO)

Debate on The rule of law in Romania: Statement by Viorica DANCILA, Romanian Prime Minister (09:19 - 09:26)

SOUNDBITE (Romanian), Viorica D&#258;NCIL&#258;, Romanian Prime Minister, Mr President, Mr. Vice President of the commission distinguished members of the European Parliament on behalf of Romania I would like to thank you for having invited me here and I am not here in order to give a count. I am here because I respect you but I request the same respect for the Romanian nation whom I represent here. Let me start with the essential question. For whom are we trying to build a functional justice system in Romania for the CVN, for the European institutions, for the magistrates, for the politicians? Of course not.

We must have fair justice for the sake of the citizens because they are the beneficiaries of the measures taken either in the European Parliament or in the national parliaments. And the discussion should start from the citizens. The justice system should offer guarantees that the citizens rights and the laws are respected and whoever breaks the laws shall be punished. It is quite honest to put the question how did this CVM defend Romanian citizens from losing their rights.

A lot has been said in those reports about institutions, about the procedure to appoint magistrates, about the fight against corruption. This is all very well but I never saw in those report any mention of human rights being trampled of secret protocols signed between the intelligence services and the judicial institutions. Based on those protocols secret protocols Millions of Romanians have been tapped by the Secret Services on behalf of the fight against corruption. There are court decisions that show how evidence was forged how the transcripts of phone taps have been altered in order to create false guilty people or how witnesses were blackmailed into giving false testimony. None of those were mentioned in the CVN reports. This means that this mechanism has missed the goal for which it was created and I officially request to be told who wrote this CVM report, who provided the data and who omitted out of negligence or out of any will omitted to mention these facts which I mentioned then which are unacceptable in the European Union.

If we want to be honest we should start from these serious cases of abuse that have happened on the territory of the European Union. The Venice committee said that in the Venice Commission said that in the Soviet system the attorney's office was a means to control the judicial power. In the past four years over 3000 magistrates have been prosecuted by the DNA by the anti-corruption section. Basically half of the magistrates of Romania have had criminal files hanging over their heads which were used in order to influence those judges to give rulings that were decided outside of the courts of law. And it's not just me who is saying that listen to the magistrates associations of Romania because they say the same thing. Through these forged cases were used in order to remove a judge from the Constitutional Court to remove a vice president of the Supreme Council of Magistracy for judges from the High Court of Cassation several judges from higher courts.

One general prosecutor and one head of senior attorneys office. In the end all these people were acquitted or their files were dismissed. However they had lost their job. The new laws on justice give back independence to the justices. There will be no politician making decisions about the appointment or the dismissal of judges. Independence is total. It's not at all restricted and I assure you that we have all the good faith and we will take into account the recommendation of the Venice Commission. However there is a good part of this day. I have a chance here today to inform you all about the cases of abuse that have been perpetrated in Romania from now on. Nobody will be able to ignore those situations. Nobody will be able to talk about the situation of the justice system in Romania without talking about these cases of abuse unless of course it's all just a political game about the justice system. But ask yourselves why were these things kept from you. Why didn't they tell you anything about these cases if they were also legal and legitimate. Ask yourselves these questions before throwing the stone to Romania. As far as the 10th of August protest meeting I will only say a few words.

The Romanian police are accused of being violent against protesters who were violent in their turn and who are trying to invade the government building. I haven't seen the same attitude towards what happened last week in Brussels or to what happened in France in Spain and other countries where the riot police have intervened in the same way with the same means and following the same procedures as the Romanian riot police did this autumn. I cannot accept that the Romanian riot police should be accused of using procedures that are being used everywhere in Europe. In conclusion let me ask you one thing. Do not deny Romania things that are permitted to other member states of the Union and do not allow that in Romania should happen things should happen that are unacceptable in other member states. We want to be partners but we want to be equal partners. No one never will be able to turn Romania back from its European. Thank you.