Anticorruption Chief Requests Government To Repeal Judicial Decree

In a statement, the institution said that Nistor informed the two cabinet officials that the it is set to lose the current chiefs of its judicial-criminal and anticorruption sections on March 20, as the decree forbids the delegation of candidates into the role in the lack of full-time appointments.

The interim DNA chief prosecutor also requested Dancila and Toader to urgently start the procedure of appointing the two section chiefs, commenting that the bill was issued without taking into account the situation of currently vacant lead offices in the Public Ministry.

Romanian Justice Minister Tudorel Toader announced on Monday that the Government will repeal some of the decree’s most controversial provisions, but also rejected the idea of a full repeal.

The bill contains several changes to the contest for admission into the National Institute of Magistracy (INM) and the attributions of the Supreme Court’s Section for Investigating Judicial Offences (SIIJ) chief-prosecutor, and also blocks delegations into chief prosecutor roles.

Before the partial repeal announced by Toader, the act also extended the eligibility criteria for top prosecutor offices to judges who have previously worked as prosecutors, instead of only prosecutors who are active at the time of the nomination.

Additionally, it amended the procedure for appointing top prosecutors, as candidacies for such offices were set to be reviewed by the plenary of the country’s top judicial watchdog, the Superior Council of the Magistracy (CSM), instead of the institution’s Prosecutors’ Section, as is currently the case.

The act was criticized by Romania’s main prosecutors’ offices, but also by top judicial watchdog CSM’s Prosecutors’ Section and by National Union of Romanian Judges. The institutions accused that its provisions might block the agencies’ activities and infringes on the principle of separating the careers of judges and prosecutors.