Terror Suspect Hayssam Fled Romania Crawling Among Sheep – President

Basescu said he cannot help referring to a case already tried, in which "a terrorist" received a lot of media attention for having presumably left the country “like a gentlemen”, when in fact he fled “crawling among sheep”.

 

The president said the people who took Hayssam on the plane were interested in discrediting prosecutors, judges and politicians interested in the legal resolution of the trial.

 

The head of state said this case is sprinkled with political interests that entail misinformation.

 

"Those people he gave money to, those who wanted to see him in parliament will try to impede you from trying him, they are interested to never let you find out how he fled," Basescu concluded.

 

Syrian businessman Omar Hayssam, sentenced to 20 years in jail for his involvement in the kidnapping of three Romanian journalists in Iraq in 2005, told prosecutor Ciprian Nastasiu on the phone that he fled the country off Otopeni international airport near Bucharest, “like a gentleman”, under an assumed identity and a new "look".

 

Several phone tappings between Hayssam and the prosecutor were declassified by the Romanian Intelligence Service to be used as evidence in the trial of Mustafa Tartoussi, who allegedly helped him flee aboard his ship.