The European Commission published Wednesday its report on the steps Romania has taken in the past twelve months in the areas of judicial reform and the fight against corruption, under the Cooperation and Verification Mechanism (CVM).
“Romania is on the right course and needs to stick to it. Tackling corruption remains the biggest challenge and the biggest priority. We welcome the progress achieved over the past year, which will need to be confirmed in 2015,” said Timmermans.
“By continuing together under the Cooperation and Verification Mechanism, which has clear support from citizens, the Commission will continue to support Romanian efforts to deliver on the independence of senior judicial appointments, closing the outstanding legislative initiatives and systematically fighting corruption,” he added.
The report assesses the recent progress made by Romania, highlighting a number of areas of continued progress showing signs of sustainability. The action taken by the key judicial and integrity institutions to address high-level corruption has maintained an impressive momentum, the report notes.
The report notes that while the implementation of the Codes (Civil, Civil Procedure, Criminal and Criminal Procedure) has shown the government and judiciary working together in a productive and pragmatic way, one year on, many legislative issues remain outstanding.
“There continues to be inconsistency in some court decisions, which raises concern. Decisions in Parliament on whether to allow the prosecution to treat parliamentarians like other citizens still seem to lack objective criteria and a reliable timetable. Parliament has also provided examples of reluctance to apply final court or Constitutional Court decisions,” the report states.