What the newspapers say: September 14, 2006

The political unrest that has taken over Romania in the last few days amplifies and the newspapers do not miss to reflect everything from different perspectives. „Filegate” brings out the former collaborators of the communist regime, who now are placed in top state positions.

Dismissals, refusals to step down and feedback to suspension add the spice to the political boiling pot today, while the 4-1 victory of Steaua Bucharest against Dinamo Kiev makes the top of the crème.

School is about to start, but the unions prepare protests and refuse to open the classes on Friday, while president Traian Basescu insists on normality and that the pupils go to school on Sept.,15. The CIA flights to Romania topic re-emerges in the press today.

The former Securitate breaks away the PM’sOffice, Cotidianul writes. Prim minister Popescu Tariceanu decided to cancel the PM‘s Office as an institution because its chief refuses to resign over an alleged collaboration with the former communist militia, aka Securitate.

Aleodor Frincu admitted he had signed three notes for the Securitate, as part of his then job, but that this was not “political militia”. Cotidianul hints that the cancellation of the PM’s Office is based on Frincu’s refusal to step down.

The collaboration with the former Securitate of former Justice minister is under the attention of the Adevarul.

The daily opens with the revelation that the former Social Democrat Justice minister Rodica Stanoiu was a collaborator of the former Securitate, and, moreover, the body studying the archives of the Securitate CNSAS found tens of pages with her declarations as informer. Following Stanoiu’s visit to the CNSAS last week, she resigned from the Social Democratic Party.

Evenimentul Zilei closed edition after the ending of the football match Steaua – Dinamo Kiev in the UEFA Champions League, which concluded with 4-1 for the Romanian team. The victory boosts Romanians’ optimism that Steaua can make it and qualify for the next phase, despite a tough group with Lyon and Real Madrid.

The last night match is even more spectacular as Steaua returned in the Champions League after 10 years of absence.

Cotidianul also focuses on a Romanian diplomatic figure dismissed from the secretary of state post within the Ministry of Foreign Affairs and replaced by a Liberal politician. Teodor Baconschi, the ambassador that brought Pope Paul II to Bucharest, was let know on Wednesday that he was no longer a state secretary.

Baconschi explained the move in the perspective of the top staff cuts and also on political grounds.

Gandul elaborates on the protests prepared by the Education unions for the first day of school, Sept. 15. Teachers from all over the country will take part in local protests to mark their discontent with the salary raise proposed by the Government.

In the meeting with the Unions, the Govt proposed a 14% increase of their salaries by the end of 2007, but a 6.5% average increase for the coming year. In response, the unions’ leaders announced the pupils not to go to school for the opening ceremonies, but invited them to join the teachers marshes throughout the country.

Romania Libera writes about a letter addressed to president Basescu by one of the Unions in Education, in which its leaders request an 18% average salary increase. The president requested unions to start school on the due day, in a meeting with the local authorities on Wednesday.

Evenimentul Zilei also focuses on the unrest in the Army and in the Government. The Liberal Teodor Atanasiu recently suspended from the position of Defense minister is to contest the suspension decree by president Traian Basescu at the Constitutional Court.

Atanasiu accuses Basescu of having taken action against him following the suspended minister’s decision to fight against the corruption within the ministry, and, more precisely, following the replacement of the Army Chief of Staff General Eugen Badalan on grounds of involvement in a barter contract that brought loss to the Army.

The Liberals feel disappointed by their leader’s position, PM Tariceanu, who released a very administrative press declaration.

Gandul writes about another alleged CIA plane that has been recorded to land in Romania, on the under- construction airport Baneasa, close to Bucharest. Its departure point was Bagram (Afghanistan).

Both the Romanian authorities and the Council of Europe team missed to gather information about this flight, but an inquiry by Chicago Tribune newspapers opened anew this topic.

The daily says that the plane carried 7 inmates from a well-known detention unit in Afghanistan and landed in Romania on December 6, 2004, 11 years before the emergence of the first revelations on the “flying prisons”.

Romania and Poland are again under the scrutiny of the international public opinion in the view of the article which suggested that officials from Washington leaked information that the flying prison exist, even before president Bush’s statement that confirmed this fact.