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What the newspapers say: January 9, 2007

HotNews.ro

Romania may be corrupt in some of its parts, may be savage in others, cynical and childishly optimistic most of the time, but people worldwide seem to find out about it from even darker portraits drawn by a biased media.

Yesterday we were crying about the slaughtered animals in the Timisoara Zoo, now we find out that the article in UK’s „The Daily Mail” was a rough exaggeration.

Ugly news about Romania are available everywhere, its useless to make more up. So let’s see what’s new today.

About the Zoo: its true the pheasants were eaten, but it was in 2005 and had nothing to do with the European Accession and the animals’ standard conditions. It was about birds that had to be sacrificed and that were donated to an orphans’ home.

A bear was shot indeed, but not in order to turn the Zoo into a more civilized place, but because it escaped and was heading towards a populated area, with a rather violent attitude.

The lion was indeed poisoned, but two other lions were also poisoned in 1991 and 1994, with the felon still uncaught. So that’s, in a few words, how last week’s slaughter was, according to Gandul.

If picking on Romania is a job description paragraph for British journalists, we have enough to feed them at any time.

For instance, we could pick on former prime minister Adrian Nastase, investigated in a few important corruption files. A new file is currently opened on the alleged trafficking of ancient (2000 years old) pieces of jewelry (read about it in Cotidianul).

One may also make fun of the way the president and the prime minister are incapable to make the Giurgiu mayor give up his illegal frontier cross tax. The tax is suspended for the moment, but Lucian Iliescu is unwilling to cancel it for good (in Evenimentul Zilei).

In his/her desperate search for inhuman acts of Romanian officials, a Daily Mail journalist may comment on the way the Health Minister changes laws over night, forcing transplant patients to jeopardize the health they struggled for.

According to minister Nicolaescu’s latest orders, a transplant patient (who already has major immunity issues to face) must travel for miles, to the transplant center where he was treated first, for any treatment, even an aspirin recipe (Gandul).

In the same Gandul, a business-specialized journalist may find it strange that the state imposes a first-but tax on vehicles, while the leasing companies maintain the same price, a price that already included all taxes and VAT on the face of the Earth.

Investigative journalists would be pleased to find out that the most controversial union leader in Romania, Liviu Luca, is finally questioned in the case of spies, corrupt high-ranked officials, and Petrom’s privatization, then wonder how Luca’s TV stations and newspapers are doing (more in Adevarul).

No wonder only 26% of Romanians trust in Justice, according to Romania Libera. Still, more of them expect better results from the European institutions.

European studies say Romanians are optimistic. A strange way to interpret the advice given by Romanian immigrants to their fellows back home: „Stay where you are. If you want a better life, you’ll rather find it in Romania”, as the Evenimentul Zilei correspondent in Frankfurt found out.

But its difficult to keep up with all the stories, when there’s no light to read a paper, right? Because soon there will be no light at all, in case Russia doesn’t open the gas pipes soon for Poland and Germany.

Its still easier to make up cry-baby zoo stories.

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