I was quite interested in seeing this rather even-handed but somewhat superficial investigation into corruption in Romania by British channel ITV, focusing on the fallout from the November 2015 Collectiv fire.

A choice quote from a Romanian interviewed for the story:

“This”, one of the survivors of the fire told me, “is what happens when as a people you don’t pay attention for a very long time.”

Truer words were never spoken.

In other news, portal News Europe essentially rewrote my story from earlier this week.

They did, however, mention a quote that I had neglected, one from Olguta Vasilescu, the mayor of Craiova and one of the sleaziest politicians in Romania. Amazing how dirtballs like Vasilescu and Alistar got quoted by Bloomberg on a piece that bemoaned the DNA as being an impediment to “getting business done”.

The poorly-written New Europe piece ends with this paragraph:

As the term of the DNA agency’s prosecutor, Laura Codruta Kovesi, expires in 2016, one wonders if the campaign she started will prove to be a “personal affair,” with Romania becoming more “business-friendly,” or a new institutional tradition has been put in place.

Indeed. Too bad the genuine desire by most Romanians to live in a corruption-free and honest country always gets trumped by the need to be “business friendly”.