DNA : Senate’s Tariceanu allegedly received 800,000 US dollars benefits from Austrian company

The Senate President, Calin Popescu-Tariceanu, indirectly received, 2007 to 2008, when he was prime minister, material benefits worth US about 800,000 dollars from an Austrian company, the National Anticorruption Directorate (DNA) shows in a reply sent to AGERPRES. “The prosecutors are conducting an investigation aimed at suspicions in relation to corruption offences having been committed regarding the cover-up of certain electoral campaign expenses with sums of money from a company that would have obtained important commercial contracts from the Romanian state. The case was set up in 2018, when three criminal cases were brought together, of which one was taken over by the DNA prosecutors at the request of the Austrian judicial authorities. Specifically, a dignitary would have indirectly received between 2007 and 2008 material benefits amounting to approximately 800,000 US dollars from the representatives of an Austrian company in exchange for the steps taken by the former in the exercise of his position, so that more additional acts be concluded to a commercial contract conducted by the company. The amount would represent a commission of 10 percent of the value of these additional documents and would have been used for the benefit of the dignitary, being transferred under fictitious contracts concluded with several offshore companies,” reads the reply sent upon AGERPRES’s request. DNA maintains that prosecution is being carried out in this case against other persons for committing the offense of complicity to bribery, and as far as Tariceanu is concerned, in accordance with the legal and constitutional provisions, conducting the criminal prosecution for the offence of bribery is conditioned by an opinion from the Senate being obtained. In this regard, the Chief Prosecutor of the DNA sent to the Prosecutor General the necessary documents for the notification of the Senate that is due to decide. DNA further affirms that the opinion requested for Tariceanu is necessary for the prosecution to be fully conducted and to give him the opportunity to formulate his defense in a legal framework.   Calin Popescu-Tariceanu: No payment made by Gov’t to Microsoft’s license account during my term   Senate President Calin Popescu-Tariceanu, leader of the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats (ALDE) stated on Wednesday that the Government did not make any payment in the Microsoft licenses account during his term (2005-2008, ed. n.) as prime minister, specifying that he did not receive any official notification regarding the beginning of the prosecution in a National Anticorruption Directorate (DNA) aimed at him. “The Government decisions that were adopted at the time were intended to index the Microsoft licenses used in public institutions. I bring to mind that this contract was signed and enforced based on a Gov’t Decision adopted in 2004,” Tariceanu told a press release sent to AGERPRES. In his opinion, “we are witnessing another product of DNA case factory.” “It is strange that, more than 10 years since my office ended and 3 years after my name firstly came up in this case, this issue is resumed, which I consider to be an extra reaction to my attitude towards combating abuses and excesses in justice. My actions obviously disturb those who have illegally seized power in the Romanian state. Considering the perjury case in which I have been acquitted, it seems that we are again witnessing another product of the DNA case FACTORY,” added Tariceanu. He further maintains that “in Romania which is preparing to assume the presidency of the Council of the European Union, these tactics can no longer function, not even the way they have been able to work so far.” “The truth about protocols and abuses has been revealed, and the legislative path of the amendments aimed at reforming justice and breaking the diseased connection with the services is irreversible. Romania can no longer go back to the times when President Basescu intervened to appoint certain prosecutors and pitted them against the political adversaries,” Tariceanu wrote on Facebook. The Chief Prosecutor of DNA sent to Prosecutor General Augustin Lazar a report in view of notifying the Senate for the formulation of a request for prosecution for the offense of bribery allegedly committed by Senate President Calin Popescu-Tariceanu. According to the cited sources, the accusation refers to the period when Tariceanu was member of the Government.

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