Minister of Justice: I expect Senate to meet next week and put dismantlement of SIIJ on agenda

Minister of Justice Stelian Ion announced on Monday that Parliament may meet in extraordinary session to discuss the bill on the repeal of the Section for the Investigation of Judicial Crimes (SIIJ), following the Venice Commission's favourable opinion, stressing that he expects the Senate to put this bill on next week's agenda. Stelian Ion explained that, on Wednesday, he will present in the meeting of the governing coalition the opinion given by the Venice Commission, whereupon Parliament should meet in an extraordinary session. "Parliament can meet in an extraordinary session without any concerns, because it has the correct solutions proposed by the Government and I want to thank Prime Minister Florin Citu for his support on this bill. In fact, this is the first measure in relation to the Justice chapter that should have been taken in the government program. The bill has been blocked in Parliament. The correct version would be the one proposed by the Government, and that is the message I will be taking to the coalition on Wednesday. We agreed at the previous coalition meeting that a special session will be proposed to solve this problem, in order to abolish the SIIJ, within two weeks from the receipt of the opinion. Here, today, we have received the opinion. If not this week, next week already an extraordinary session for the dismantlement of the SIIJ would be expected (...) These are important issues, which will be considered, of course, in the coming days, all the paragraphs of this opinion, which has no fewer than 14 pages. I call on my fellow senators to promptly consider this bill, to report to the Legal Committee and further to have a final vote cast in the Senate," Stelian Ion told a press conference. The Minister of Justice specified that he expects the Senate to meet next week, emphasizing that now there are no more arguments not to dismantle the SIIJ. "I expect the Senate to meet next week and put on the agenda the dismantlement of the Section for the Investigation of Judicial Crimes. It is a matter already assumed in the coalition, and with these arguments, I think there are no other arguments that could prevent this demarche. If this were to happen, there would already be serious questions about compliance with the government program, compared to the real arguments that some or other actors in the judiciary might bring, because some proposals have been criticized and the abolition of the SIIJ itself has received some criticism from certain parts of the judiciary, but also from some politicians. Given this confirmation from an independent body of the Council of Europe, which is made up of several members, that consists mainly of specialists in constitutional law and is therefore outside this internal turmoil and all the clashes over this issue, given this support - and I would like to thank the members of the Venice Commission, especially for promptly answering our request - so in view of all these aspects I see no other impediment," said Stelian Ion. AGERPRES (RO - author: Eusebi Manolache, editor: Andreea Rotaru; EN - author: Simona Iacob, editor: Simona Klodnischi)