How did you find out about these 3 black spots of Romanian democracy, namely, gross failures in achieving an independent justice from the government, governmental pressure upon the press and the increased corruption? Why only you (and a few other people) and why know?

I am not the rapporteur, Mrs Nicholson is, so I have her report and the report from the European Commission. In my view, frequently the bodies in the Commission are really diplomatic and there wording covers up the weak spots in Romania. It is the same with Turkey, for instance. Commissioners encourage the accession countries and when they criticize these countries, they place this criticism in a very diplomatic way. I don't think this is very helpful for the new governments (from Eastern Europe, n.m.) that you have to soften in this way our criticism. I know from previous reports from Mrs. Nicholson that these big questions mentioned by me now, like the situation of orphanages are changed in a good way. Now, I saw again as a coordinator of the EPP group these reports on different candidate states. And specifically, on Romania for which I have a great interest from the beginning because of the fact that Romania and Bulgaria are lagging behind. So, they need more attention and then I got the impression that on the important points there is no real progress but deteriorations. The present government seems to be more corrupt than the previous one and if that is so, we have to say quite clearly where the problems are. On the other hand, being a rapporteur for Turkey, I am very seriously handling the Turkish failures. And the Turkish negotiator said, "why are you so hard on Turkey and you don't say anything about Romania?". I got the impression that he is partly right and to be evenhanded. Even when the member states (applicant countries) are lagging behind with the political criteria of Copenhagen we should impose on these countries whatever is necessary to fulfill these criteria. So as a gesture of evenhandedness may I also say if Romania is lagging behind, on this fundamental question of the political criteria, then we also, just like Turkey, should handle those things first. And it is quite an illusion to think that handling the difficult chapters, in the way they are handled now, will be enough.

I saw the EPP resolution adopted by the last congress (for 5th of Feb 2004) and I am quoting "the dominant position of the present party in power (in Romania) is a handicap to the proper development of democracy. The state of public administration of justice (often controlled by the political power) and the very high level reached by corruption is very disturbing. So I would like to ask you your opinion about these statements.

Perhaps I am a difficult person, but anyway, I didn't write this resolution, you can understand that if you read the text further. In that resolution, EPP did not support me...ha, ha, ha. I just spoke with the former Belgian prime minister Wilfried Martens and I said to him, why did you deliver this kind of resolution? To let it be adopted in an unguarded moment in the Congress without asking for my amendments however, before this resolution was adopted? Then, I explained my amendments to Mr. Victor Ciorbea, who came here to make lobby for the government....ha, ha, ha... very strange ... I explained to Mr. Ciorbea in my best French that the terms "suspend the negotiation in the present form" was changed in "reorient the program of negotiation". Nevertheless, the EPP produced this resolution (Martens has corrected this mistake on the EPP web site). So look on the EPP web site and you will see ... Nevertheless, it remains a miracle for me how things work in Romania where so called Christian Democrats or pretending to belong to this family, come here to lobby for their government. And in the meantime trying to misinform people about the failures of Romania. ha, ha, ha. In Britain they speak about "her majesty's most faithful opposition"... But anyway, I know some things from the Balkans: labels of parties don't mean very much...

What do you mean?

If you call yourself Social Democrat, you don't need to be a Social Democrat at all. If you call yourself a liberal, you need not be a liberal at all. And if you are a Christian-Democrat, you mention yourself, might be or might not be.

Some people in Romania found different scenarios about your amendments on Romania: for delaying the entrance of Romania in the EU, or maybe for putting more conditions for accession or to empower the Romanian Christian Democrats .

If there are some Christian Democrats in Romania ... .

What is your opinion about 2007 as a date for the Romanian accession?

I have always resisted, as a strategy rapporteur for enlargement, to mention any dates. I was successful in preventing putting any dates for the 10 accession countries. These ten are now entering Europe, but I have always been sharply against mentioning the dates. Of course, all these candidate member states asked for a date, but I said I cannot present you with a date. Because it is your work. If you are very successful and have a very good government and a hardworking people and enthusiasm, you might be in earlier than expected. If you will fall back under an authoritarian rule or planned government or whatever, then you will lag behind more. So we cannot present you with a date. It is up to you, you may fix yourself a date for your accession, it is not up to us. It is your business... And these ten countries worked hard.

Harder than Romania?

Yes, harder than Romania. Harder than Romania and Bulgaria. Specifically for Bulgaria who has a rapporteur, who started nearly to act as an ambassador for the country. I understand this, because when you go there a lot, you end up loving a country. And you like to see the privileges of this country. It is very human. He himself, asked for a date. And then I couldn't resist anymore and told him that they themselves fixed a date, 2004-2007 etc. Then come later also Romania. I think maybe I am a little bit dogmatic in this point, but I am right. The same for Turkey, you should not mention a date. When they are ready, they are ready.

For Turkey, I think it is better not to mention a date. Because if you mentioned 2050, they won't be happy .

When you mention a date, people might become lazy or disappointed or demotivated. I am enthusiastic about enlargement. I think it is a miracle, a fantastic miracle, but I am also very realistic. For that reason I said to the Hungarians, don't mention 2004 as a date for accession. Finally, they enter in 2004 but we should never mention a date before.

Do you think it is such a big difference between oriental Europe and Central Europe and the Baltic states?

There is a rather big difference. Most of the Communist countries who enter in 2004 liberated themselves from Communism and threw away the old regimes and embraced a better life. It is obvious, it is a fact, so we always believed their strong drive to fulfill in the first place the question of rule of law and democracy. And they did. In Turkey on the other hand, I think, there is two-thirds of the population who agrees with the Kemalist system. They invested in their own system, but this is not compatible with the system of the European Union. And it makes it so extremely difficult to leave something behind themselves. And then on this dimension, you see Romania.

 We had Ceausescu .

You had Ceausescu. Luckily you liberated yourselves from him. But the atmosphere, the habits, and the way of governing Romania, seems too much, too connected to the whole situation from where also all the corruption is coming. For the old system was of course very corrupt. I mean not officially... ha ha, ha but it was very corrupt. And this survival of corruption is returning somehow or becomes more powerful again. And nowadays, we hear many stories about economic and financial questions but also about direct threats to people who are criticizing in different way. This cannot be acceptable. In our view, this is one of the first issues which should be solved because without a free and responsible press, it is very difficult to change the character of the state. So, for that reason I said: the present candidate member states who are entering in May don't have these problems but in Romania the political criteria became problematic nowadays. So for this reason, just a moment, we have to concentrate on that.

On the same resolution of the EPP congress calls on all Eastern Europeans who intend to assume a political function in the EU institutions to disclose their professional and political activities in former Communist states and to refrain from taking up a European post if they formed part of the repressive communist agencies. How can you check these issues?

I don't agree with this statement. In my view you sometimes need to know these people. I met politicians at high level but who did not know how to handle different practical situations. They had good intentions, but quite naďve... it is strange. And nevertheless, I am quite honest with you, I had sometimes this feeling in Yugoslavia, and I remember also once somebody from a delegation from the Baltic States who said to me, how they intended to get rid of all the heavy industry and get back to agriculture, ... I said to them "please don't do that, we have already more than enough". They were very sympathetic people and they are on the right side, but they don't have any idea how to govern a country. Sometimes you need, like in Germany after the Second World War, the old ones who served the bad regime, but nevertheless, have the capacity to govern a country.
For that reason I am not against the presence of the former communists or the ... reformed communists ... The same applies for Romania; sometimes you need certain people to govern, so for me this is not a key point for Romania. The key point is: are these people really able to defend the rule of law...? If they are not doing that, then I have a problem with them. So if these people are changed in a democratic way. It is okay, if not then we have a problem. You have to change a lot in Romania, you have a problem with the judiciary. Here you have to change enormously, the public prosecutors, the judges and to quickly train new people. It is very important to have new people in power who knows what rule of law means. The new people could be ministers from their thirties by now.
There are also positive achievements in Romania. Education system, grosso modo is a European one, then you have interesting things to present ...in fact, the perspectives for Romania are not bad but the question is that you should have good governments to exploit the positive parts. From my point of view, I am fully aware that underling the positive chances could be helpful for Romania.

At this moment I am very glad that asking to suspend the accession negotiations had an enormous effect. Now, I have the feeling that my proposal was a waking call for Romanians which should not be forget, ha, ha, ha ...Of course, some of the MEPs from another parliamentarian group would like to soften the text resolution more and more but in the end this resolution will be stronger than it was ever.
Also, for the Commission the resolution is very important because there is as well, criticism from the Commission but the Commission is not handling first things first.

Mr. Oostlander is a friend of Romania?

I consider myself a friend of Romania, for this reason I visited Romania much more than other parliamentarians and I am a friend of all other accession countries.

Will you candidate for a new mandate in the European Parliament?

No, I am 67 years old and I have to give the place to the new generation and this will be a good example for all those old people in Bucharest who should let their places for young people.

I hope in the future you will have the same interest in Romania.

Yes, sure... soon I will have even new interests concerning Romania, as a tourist, now after all of this I hope I can visit Romania in my holidays....ha, ha, ha!

Thanks a lot for this excellent conversation.

Victor Iulian TUCĂ
17 February, European Parliament, Brussels