NAD requests that Adrian Severin’s immunity be lifted

National Anticorruption Directorate requested that MEP Adrian Severin’s parliamentary immunity be lifted because he was suspected of bribery and influence peddling.

The National Anticorruption Directorate sent the aforementioned request to Cătălin Predoiu, Minister of Justice, in order to deliver it to Jersey Buzek, President of the European Parliament.
The National Anticorruption Directorate asserts that the request has been made according to the European Union’s protocol which relates to privileges and immunity and to acts stipulated in the regulation of procedure of the European Parliament.

Likewise, anti-corruption prosecutors claim that lifting parliamentary immunity is a prior condition to the criminal investigation.

On 21 March, the National Anticorruption Directorate was informed that there was the possibility of the MEP having committed corruption acts taking into account that there were revealed some audio recordings that were advertised by the Sunday Times.

On 28 March, during the meeting held by the Executive Bureau of PSD, (Democratic Social Party) the MEP Adrian Severin announced that he would resign from the party.

"Please, allow me to retire from the PSD and keep in mind that this is a statutory decision which will not be able to break our relation", Adrian Severin said.

He was expelled among the European socialists, too.

The other two members of the European Parliament who appeared in the Sunday Times’ recordings are the former Slovene Foreign Minister, Zoran Taler, and the former Austrian Minister of the Interior, Ernst Strasser.

Both of them retired from the European Parliament.

Translated by: Cristina Anamaria Maricescu
MA Student, MTTLC, Bucharest University