Romania Urged to Make Political Funding Transparent

The new report issued on Tuesday by the Council of Europe's Group of States against Corruption, GRECO, said the Balkan country had improved its work to combat bribery and influence-trading, but hasn't achieved any progress in making political funding more transparent.

This is Council of Europe second compliance report on Romania; the first was issued in 2010.

"Romania has implemented satisfactorily only seven of the 20 recommendations GRECO made in its Third Round Evaluation Report, adopted in 2010. Nine recommendations remain or have been partly implemented, and four recommendations have still not been implemented," the new report said.

Romania has also not used the two years since the adoption of the first Compliance Report to accomplish any progress in making political funding transparent, the report added.

GRECO therefore has asked the Romanian authorities for a report on the progress made in implementing the recommendations by June 30 at the latest.

Draft amendments to the law on financing the activities of political parties and election campaigns is currently in parliament. If adopted, it would bring a series of improvements, according to GRECO's report.

Romania however still has problems related to the way political parties are financing their campaigns.

Early this month, Romania's Supreme Court jailed super-rich businessman Ioan Niculae for two years and six months for illegaly financing one of the main candidates in the 2009 presidential campaign.

The court said Niculae paid 150,000 euros to a member of the then opposition Social Democratic Party, PSD, ahead of the presidential elections, in exchange for influence in the government. The court ordered Niculae to repay the bribe.

In an unrelated case...