Romanian President Calls Journalist "A Fairy"

Romanian president Traian Basescu Friday publicly called a male journalist "a fairy," as quoted by Mediafax wire service.

Basescu allegedly used the derogatory word at the end of the ceremony installing the new head of the Romanian counter-intelligence service, while exiting the building along the former and the newly appointed head of the agency, Radu Timofte and George Maior, respectively.

Ovidiu Zara, the journalist with the Cotidianul daily to whom the word was directed, overheard Basescu, as did two other journalists and a cameraman.

The exchange of questions and answers that led to Basescu’s reaction started with the president stating that former intelligence officers working with two divisions of the Securitate were no longer on the staff of the current SRI.

Zara asked Basescu if it could be inferred from this that no former Securitate officer was currently on the SRI pay-roll.

"If you needed a headline for tomorrow, you already had it," Basescu said, while mumbling the infamous calls when exiting the building. The exact words Basescu used while commenting to Timofte and Maior are really impossible to go to print both in Romanian and in English. The closest equivalent would be that Basescu said Zara was "a fairy thinking he could outsmart us."

Zara, who walked right behind the three officials, overheard Basescu and reacted: "How big of you, Mr. President."
"I have no other words for you and your colleagues; do not try to entrap people with your questions," Basescu answered back.

Basescu took part Friday in the ceremonies installing in office the new heads of the intelligence and counter-intelligence agencies, Claudiu Saftoiu and Maior, respectively.

Basescu thanked both former heads of the agencies, Timofte and Gheorghe Fulga, respectively, for their work and stressed that the new directors should continue the reforms started before they took office.