Press Review - November 5, 2018

11.05.2018 By Oana Gavrila

Finance Minister Threatens to Dismiss Tax Agency Head

Finance minister Eugen Teodorovici threatened to dismiss the head of the tax administration ANAF unless things change.

“Regarding ANAF's checking of weddings that took place years ago, I will have a talk with them because they need to be concerned with large tax evasion. There's VAT fraud, tax evasion in large sectors of the economy,” said the minister.

#TeleormanLeaks. Local Finds Suitcase with Documents Related to Major Fraud Case

A suitcase with documents from Tel Drum, a company at the center of a major EU fund fraud and corruption case in Romania, was allegedly found by a villager in the rural area of Teleorman county, according to investigative journalism platform Rise Project.

The suitcase reportedly contained a hard drive with documents and photos from the computer of a key person in Tel Drum, a tablet belonging to former Tel Drum general manager Petre Pitis, a memory stick with company documents and over 1,000 paper documents.

Rise Project said it would start publishing the information in the following days.

Tel Drum, currently under insolvency, has been linked by the local media to Liviu Dragnea, the leader of the ruling party in Romania. Dragnea has always denied any connection to the company, which used to be controlled through bearer shares.

Junior Coalition Party ALDE Files Same-Sex Civil Union Bill

Two lawmakers from junior coalition party ALDE have filed a bill in the Senate regulating civil unions including for same-sex couples.

The bill was submitted five days after another bill regulating same-sex partnerships was filed in Senate bearing signatures from social democrat Florin Manole, liberal Ovidiu Raetchi and other MPs from PNL, UDMR, USR, but not ALDE.

This is the third bill on same-sex partnerships filed in Parliament within the past year.