Tariceanu nuances statements on presidency of EU Council: I meant that politically we are in scandals

Alliance of Liberals and Democrats (ALDE) President Calin Popescu Tariceanu stated on Monday, referring to his statement according to which Romania is not ready to take over the presidency of the Council of the EU, that he was referring to domestic political scandals. “I referred – and I see the Premier also understood my message – to the fact that politically we are permanently in scandals and the topic is being exported at European level, I would have liked a kind of truce concerning the means through which we wage the political battle. We should give up on the criminal complaints amply used by Orban and the Liberals. We should not export these disputes at the level of European countries. We are the only country doing this and it is regrettable. From a technical and administrative standpoint, I have no doubt Romania is ready to take over the presidency of the Council of the EU,” Calin Popescu Tariceanu stated. PSD President Liviu Dragnea stated last Friday, at the Palace of Parliament, that he is still waiting for ALDE President Calin Popescu Tariceanu to explain why he said Romania is not ready to take over the rotating presidency of the Council of the EU. “I have to receive an answer – and I will receive it, not myself, but the party – to the claim regarding Romania’s inability to manage the presidency of the EU Council, which seems to me to be a very serious statement and, if there are argument, I want to talk, if there is not, we must stop using that phrase because there is no reason. The government is ready, the Chamber of Deputies is ready, the secretary general of the European Commission said so when he came here and had substantive meeting. I think it’s good not to play with words,” Dragnea said. ALDE President Calin Popescu Tariceanu stated on Thursday that, given the total political war these months, Romania is not ready to take over the presidency of the Council of the EU. Considering the last months’ total political war, Romania is not ready to take over presidency of the Council of the European Union, the Senate’s president Calin Popescu-Tariceanu wrote on Thursday on his Facebook page. He stressed that the agreement tabled by the ALDE  to the parliamentary parties is “one of the last trains” as regards the successful management of this European mandate. “Many have said that the ALDE’s request to finding a consensus would equal with a step behind in the effort to halt the abuses. Nothing could be further from the truth. Ahead of all, the fact that today the European officials start to admit that in Romania a serious problem in connection with the protocols exists, the fact that today talk is made about regulating the abusive phone calls’ tapping is also the result of the ALDE’s effort. And yet efforts carried out with pragmatism, consistency, by using both the political discourse’s weapons and the diplomacy’s. We must understand the moment Romania is crossing, hence the agreement proposed by the ALDE is paramount. Firstly, one must say that given the conditions of the total political war these months, Romania is not ready to take over presidency of the EU Council. It is an 11th hour warning I’m addressing with responsibility to all of the political people, to the Romanian president in particular and to the opposition’s parliamentary parties’ leaders,” Tariceanu wrote. In his opinion, “they who think that the European leaders will be sympathetic, when in an electoral year the Bucharest politicians wish themselves at war, are wrong” and “Romania is already losing ground and will have but to lose hugely if things do not change urgently.” “Should the president and the opposition parties will continue to deny the illegal protocols’ and abuses’ existence and will refuse any dialogue for Romania moves forward, then we shall miss a big chance we have to have our voice heard at the EU level. We shall continue to be sent to the corner by the European leaders who understand way better the political and diplomatic games and act in their own countries’ interest. The agreement proposed by the ALDE is one of the last, if not the very last train as regards the successful management of the EU Council’s presidency,” he added. Tariceanu added that the accord proposed by the ALDE is “an open appeal to responsibility”. “They who believe that the political battle has stopped at the Parliament halls or in the televisions’ rooms are wrong. Each time I go in the country I can see the major fracture that is happening in the Romanian society. We must stop this fracture, we must mend what is to be mended and reopen the dialogue at the entire society’s level. These are not big words, they are real things the Romanians feel on their own skin. It is a huge question mark on how we made it to arrive here, in the Centennial year of the Greater Union that the Romanian society is more divided than ever. That is why I come up with this pact to the entire Romanian society that is finding itself represented at the Parliament level, to both the Power and the Opposition. I know no Romanian to wish to have their phone tapped, to live in a country of the illegal protocols and abuses. The principles that the ALDE is putting forward want to re-establish a balance where the Romanians regardless of their (political) belief, win back their trust in the judiciary and their confidence that this is not used as a tool to eliminate the inconvenient political opponents,” Tariceanu wrote on his Facebook page.   ALDE leader on relationship with Dragnea: Rumour beats reality. We’re not born by the same mother   Referring to the relationship with PSD leader Liviu Dragnea, Tariceanu stated on Monday that rumour beats reality, claiming that the relationship is not better or worse than in recent days. “I’ve seen in recent days in...