EU Telecoms Commissioner Offered Romanian Telecom Min Support To Solve Regulator Issue

He added a general manager within the European Commission will come to Bucharest in February to discuss the case.

The European Commission decided Thursday to launch infringement procedures against Romania, which breached EU rules regarding the independence of its national telecom regulator, the Commission said in a press release.

The Commission said in its release that the Romanian government’s decision in 2008 first to remove the President of the national telecoms regulator and then, after a court ruling suspending this decision, to restructure and rename this authority represents, in the view of the European Commission, a serious violation of the regulator’s independence.

Following repeated warnings, the Commission opened an infringement proceeding against Romania by sending a letter of formal notice under Article 226 of the EC Treaty to the Romanian government.

The press release adds that Reding spoke Wednesday morning on the phone with the recently appointed Romanian Minister for Communications and Information Technology, Mr. Gabriel Sandu, – who had inherited this issue from the previous government – to discuss how the current illegality of the legislation in Romania could be changed in conformity with the letter and the spirit of EU law.

"Independent national regulators are the backbone of the EU telecoms rules and are therefore central to fair regulation in Europe’s single telecoms market," Reding said in the release.

"It is worrying to see the government of an EU Member State nullifying, in 2008, the effects of a court ruling, particularly as it is not the first time this has happened in Romania. I call on the Romanian authorities to do their utmost to ensure the stability and independence of the telecoms regulator, both for legal certainty and for sound and fair regulation of the market. I offer my support and the advice of my services to the Romanian authorities, in particular to the new Minister Gabriel Sandu, to help bring its telecoms rules into line with EU law, so that it fully respects the independence of the telecoms regulator,” she added.