JusMin Toader: Since the 1990s only four clemency actions taken under existing constitution

Justice Minister Tudorel Toader said on Tuesday that according to the Constitution, crime and punishment is governed by organic law, but the fundamental law gives the government the possibility to adopt emergency ordinances that generate legal effects, adding that since 1990 only four clemency actions gave been taken according to Agerpres.

"I am not the government; I am only a member of the government. Article 73 (h) of the Constitution, says that crime and punishment is governed by organic law. Since 1990s, only four clemency actions have been taken under the existing constitutional provisions (...) In order to avoid a sensitive subject, I want to remind you that under the Constitution, Article 115, the government is empowered to adopt emergency ordinances which, in order to produce legal effects; in my opinion, the Constitution wrongly says that an ordinance produces legal effects at the time of its publication in the Official Journal. One can adopt it today, publish it today in the Journal and today it enters into force, today it starts producing legal effects, which means gone is predictability and other things. But two additional conditions are also required: being registered with the secretaries of the two chambers of Parliament and being published in the Official Journal. The first condition, in turn, presupposes another condition, that Parliament is in session," Toader told DCNews web publication in response to whether a government emergency ordinance on amnesty and pardon is in the pipeline.