Former PM and PSD Leader Adrian Nastase Says Prosecutors Doctor Cases against Him

Former PM and head of the Social Democrat Party Adrian Nastase, officially indicted Monday for allegedly taking bribes, Wednesday presented the media what he deemed to be the weak points of the indictment filed against him by the anti-corruption prosecutors.

"More than 90%, of the 680-page long indictment, are in fact a selection from the 12,000 pages of statements taken by prosecutors from drivers and other individuals with equally important and relevant jobs," said Nastase.

He presented as a case in point the statement made by Ioan Paun. Nastase said Paun’s first statement was changed with one given at a later date, resulted after the latter struck a deal with prosecutors, who changed his status from indicted person to witness in Nastase’s case.

"I am shocked, and I do not understand why Mr. Paun agreed to do such a filthy thing. It is unacceptable," added Nastase.

Nastase said anti-corruption prosecutors tried very hard to pin down an indictment on him, as proven by the various attempts they made to build several cases against him.
First, prosecutors said Nastase received bribes from Irina Jianu, "but when the latter publicly denied the fact, prosecutors moved on to build a case against me on grounds that I used illegal funding for the electoral campaign. When that case fell through, they tried to say that items other than construction material were shipped from China to Romania, to build my house," Nastase said.

"I have no idea where Paun had the 118,000 dollars from. There is a press release from the anti-corruption prosecutors’ office stating that they blocked one of my accounts with that amount of money on it. But the mind-boggling fact is that the prosecutors took the money from Paun, then put it in an account they opened on my name, and afterwards blocked that bank account," explained Nastase.

Nastase said he will fight all the indictments both in national and European courts.