Former PM Florin Citu showed up on Wednesday at the National Anti-corruption Directorate (DNA) headquarters, where prosecutors will announce that he has been charged with abuse of office in the case concerning the purchase of vaccines against COVID-19, in which the damage would be over 1 billion euros.
Upon entering the DNA headquarters, Florin Citu refused to answer journalists' questions, but promised to give details on his way out.
Currently a senator, Florin Citu was stripped of his immunity following a Senate decision on 29 November.
The vaccines case also targets former health ministers Vlad Voiculescu and Ioana Mihaila.
According to DNA, on 17 June 2020, the European Commission launched the European Strategy on speeding up the development, manufacturing and distribution of vaccines against COVID-19 proposing a centralised approach for the procurement of viable vaccine options and which involved the EC negotiating advance purchase agreements with manufacturers on behalf of member states.
The vaccines were to be distributed to EU member states according to population numbers, and the decision on priority vaccination of certain categories of the population was up to the member states, the DNA mentions.
Investigators maintain that member states had the possibility to use, within 5 days of notification, an "opt-out" clause, so they were not bound to pay any contribution for vaccines they decided not to request.
"In the present case, in the above-mentioned context, aspects related to the way in which, between January and May 2021, members of the Romanian Government, in violation of the legal provisions and without any documents/analysis proving the necessity of the purchase, contracted a much higher number of vaccine doses (Pfizer and Moderna), when the number of people eligible for vaccination communicated by the Romanian State to the European Commission was 10.7 million," explain the prosecutors.
According to the DNA, although the vaccine doses contracted prior to 1 January 2021 (37,588,366 doses) would have been sufficient to vaccinate more than 23 million people, two of the three persons against whom the requests for criminal prosecution are issued, benefiting from the help of the third, would have negotiated and ordered the purchase of an extra 52,805,690 doses of vaccine, worth a total of 1,005,498,687 euros, plus VAT, which constitutes a loss to the state budget. AGERPRES
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