VZCZCXRO0873
RR RUEHDBU RUEHFL RUEHKW RUEHLA RUEHROV RUEHSR
DE RUEHBM #1092/01 1871705
ZNY CCCCC ZZH
R 061705Z JUL 06
FM AMEMBASSY BUCHAREST
TO RUEHC/SECSTATE WASHDC 4770
INFO RUEHZL/EUROPEAN POLITICAL COLLECTIVE

C O N F I D E N T I A L SECTION 01 OF 03 BUCHAREST 001092 
 
SIPDIS 
 
SIPDIS 
 
STATE DEPT FOR EUR/NCE - BILL SILKWORTH 
STATE DEPT FOR EUR/UMB - COLIN FURST 
 
E.O. 12958: DECL: 07/06/2016 
TAGS: PREL PGOV MD RO
SUBJECT: ROMANIAN PRESIDENT WELCOMES MOLDOVAN YOUTH TO 
THEIR "HOMELAND," INVITES THEM TO REUNITE INSIDE EU 
 
REF: BUCHAREST 00980 
 
Classified By: DCM MARK TAPLIN FOR REASONS 1.4 (B) & (D). 
 
¶1. (C) Summary: In remarks to a group of visiting Moldovan 
teenagers, President Basescu spoke in terms of Romania's 
hopes and plans to reunite with Moldova once inside the 
European Union. His statements, which included an "offer" to 
Moldova to join the EU along with Romania and a promise of 
more scholarships for Moldovan students and continued ease of 
access to Romania after accession, raised eyebrows among many 
Moldova-followers in Bucharest.  MFA officials and the 
Moldovan Embassy deny that the president's words reflected 
any official offers or conversations between Romania and 
Moldova. The European Commission delegation suggested EC 
President Barosso, along with the Finnish presidency would 
deliver "private" messages to President Basescu regarding his 
statements. End Summary. 
 
¶2. (C) Romanian President Traian Basescu announced to a group 
of Moldovan students on July 1 that "Romania has offered to 
the Republic of Moldova, to the Moldovan head of state, the 
option to join the European Union at the same time with us." 
He later added, "We are the only country, the only people 
that is still divided. Germany has reunited its nation; 
Romania is still divided between two countries. But, I 
repeat, our reunification will take place inside the European 
Union, not otherwise." He also said that once Romania accedes 
to the EU, he would try to simplify the visa system for 
Moldovans and "smooth the access of the citizens of Republic 
of Moldova to Romanian citizenship." A translation of the 
full text of his remarks, as posted in Romanian on the 
Romanian presidency website (www.presidency.ro), is below in 
paragraph 7. 
 
¶3. (C) According to Dan Iancu, Head of the Romanian MFA 
Bureau for Cooperation with Moldova, no such plan exists that 
is "written on paper." Romanian officials appeared unclear 
themselves over when Basescu might have pitched this idea to 
Moldovan President Voronin.  Both Iancu and MFA Director 
General for Eastern Europe Razvan Rusu acknowledged that such 
a discussion could well have taken place between the two 
presidents. Iancu said that their last meeting was on 
December 10, 2005, during President Voronin's trip to 
Bucharest. Iancu suggested, however, that such a discussion 
would have more likely happened at the first meeting between 
Basescu and Voronin, in January 2005 in Chisinau.  While the 
two presidents did not have a bilateral meeting during the 
June Black Sea Summit, he remarked, the two do talk 
frequently by phone. Iancu said that Basescu's visit to 
Chisinau, previously scheduled for July, would not likely 
occur until after the summer. He explained that Romania's 
approach to Moldova was to "attempt to build a new image for 
Moldovans" as a South Eastern European state in addition to 
being a CIS state. Iancu said Romanians and Moldovans would 
"see each other in the EU, where borders don't matter." He 
said reunification is "not something we have in mind for now." 
 
¶4. (C) The European Commission Delegation in Romania had no 
plans to respond to Basescu's statements on Moldova, 
according to the delegation's Political Analyst Sorin Moisu. 
However, he said that EC President Jose Manuel Barosso and 
the Finnish EU Presidency would raise the issue privately 
with Basescu. Moisu offered that the EC was still trying to 
make sense of Basescu's statements, noting both the 
"political and technical impossibility" of Basescu's offer 
for Moldova to join the EU with Romania. Moisu believed 
Russia and Ukraine would likely ask for clarification of 
Basescu's comments as well. 
 
¶5. (C) Moldovan DCM Larissa Pasecinic commented to PolOff 
that "this is not the first such declaration," but added that 
Moldova is "very grateful to Basescu" for "presenting Moldova 
in international fora, making its problems more well known." 
She said Basescu's formulation had been oversimplified for 
his youthful audience, and was not a realistic version of any 
official discussions. She said the real concern was not the 
statement, but rather how it was being portrayed in the media 
and how it had "triggered negative events in Transnistria." 
She cited the July 5 press conference of Transnistrian 
"Security Minister" Antufeyev, who cited Basescu's remarks as 
a threat that required counterbalancing by supplementing the 
Russian troops in the region. Pasecinic said there was "no 
such official proposition from the Romanian government" and 
that Moldova's "future homework for EU accession was not so 
simple." Pasecinic said Basescu's offer to ease visa 
requirements was akin to Moldova's current agreement with 
Poland, which expedites the process for certain categories of 
travelers. Pasecinic said Basescu's promise to facilitate 
 
BUCHAREST 00001092  002 OF 003 
 
 
Molodovan requests for Romanian citizenship was a reflection 
of Romania's extremely bureaucratic system of granting 
citizenship, which some Moldovans have been unable to 
complete since first applying in the mid-1990s. She said it 
"does not mean that everyone will be able to get Romanian 
citizenship." 
 
¶6. (C) Canadian Charge d' Affaires, Jean Therriault, who 
covers Moldova from Bucharest, opined to PolOff that Basescu 
had probably spoken "off the cuff." He noted that many 
Moldovans, "not just Russian speakers, but also Romanian 
speakers" as well as the current Moldovan government, did not 
welcome Basescu's suggestion. Therriault felt that Basescu's 
remarks reflected both his genuine belief in the eventual 
prospects for a Romanian-Moldovan union within the European 
Union as well as an over-eager attempt to appeal to 
nationalist elements in the Romanian electorate. 
 
¶7. (U) Embassy's translation of President Basescu's remarks: 
 
The speech of Traian Basescu, President of Romania, on the 
occasion of the lunch hosted for the children from the 
Republic of Moldova, winners of the "Olympics" competition in 
History 
 
- Cotroceni Palace, July 1, 2006 - 
 
Dear Sirs and Madams Professors, 
Dear Children, 
 
      First of all, I would like to thank you for accepting 
the invitation to have lunch with the President of Romania. 
It is a great honor for me that you accepted to spend an hour 
together. 
 
      At the same time, I would like you to know that I was 
extremely pleased when I heard that you accepted to change 
your program to accommodate this visit to Cotroceni. I hope 
that the change in your program will not prevent you to 
eventually visit Peles Castle - a monument worthwhile seeing 
not on only for its beauty, but also for it is place in our 
history, very much like Cotroceni Palace, where we are today. 
Cotroceni Palace is also part of Romanian history as much as 
everything else you have visited in Bucharest today. 
 
      I am glad that we can host in Bucharest very good 
students, winners of the "Olympics" competition in History, 
who are extremely knowledgeable in history. As good students 
in history, you know that Romania has denounced the 
Ribbentrop-Molotov pact, which broke the Romanian nation in 
two. We accept the will of the authorities from Chisinau to 
stay apart from Romania, as an independent state, which 
carves out its own path to its Euro-Atlantic future. 
 
      For these reasons, I was one of the politicians who 
always supported the need to have a very good relationship 
with the Republic of Moldova, an open relationship that might 
be of help in assisting to speed-up the steps taken by the 
Republic of Moldova, to be able, in the not so distant 
future, to get again together, this time inside the European 
Union. 
 
      I would like you to know from me something that I would 
like to tell you -- to the extent I can tell you this -- that 
Romania has offered to the Republic of Moldova, to the 
Moldovan head of state, the option to join the European Union 
at the same time with us. It is however the decision of the 
authorities from Chisinau and of the people of the Republic 
of Moldova. 
 
      For me, your visit to Bucharest is a very important 
fact and it is in our policy to create conditions for as many 
children from the Republic of Moldova to come and study in 
Romania. Certainly next year we will increase the number of 
students from the Republic of Moldova who will be accepted as 
students in Romanian universities. 
 
      I ask you to be convinced that, when Romania will be a 
EU member, we will do whatever is necessary to prevent the 
border from becoming an impenetrable barrier for the citizens 
of the Republic of Moldova, and especially for the young 
people who really want to study (in Romania). 
 
      I believe the cultural links, the links between our 
national educational units, are instrumental in maintaining 
for the years to come the links between two countries that 
were once one country. We are the only country, the only 
people that is still divided. Germany has reunited its 
nation; Romania is still divided in two countries. But, I 
 
BUCHAREST 00001092  003 OF 003 
 
 
repeat, our unification will take place inside the European 
Union, not otherwise. 
 
      I thank you very much. I want to assure you that 
Romania will continue in the future to create conditions for 
the young people from the Republic of Moldova to learn and 
study in Romania to become useful in their country. 
 
      I want you also to know that immediately after our 
integration into the EU, in agreement with the European 
Commission, we will try to put in place a simplified visa 
system for the Republic of Moldova and, at the same time, to 
smooth the access of the citizens of Republic of Moldova to 
Romanian citizenship. 
 
      I thank you very much, I wish you bon appetite and I 
assure you that you are always welcomed in Romania, in other 
words welcomed in your own homeland. 
 
      Thank you very much! 
 
End Translation. 
 
¶8. (C) Comment: Basescu's formulations on Moldova at the July 
1 event went beyond previous statements he has made on the 
subject of the two countries' relationship.  While he first 
raised the notion of a reunited Romania and Moldova within an 
expanded European Union in January in front of an audience of 
foreign diplomats, Saturday's media event was the first time 
Basescu has spoken in public of an "offer" for Moldova to 
join the European Union alongside Romania.  On one level, it 
was a characteristic unscripted Basescu moment, the kind that 
makes his communications advisor cringe.  Foreign Minister 
Ungureanu told the Ambassador around the margins of the July 
4th reception that he had heard Basescu on one occasion raise 
the idea with Voronin of entering the EU together, but 
insisted that the Romanian president had presented it in a 
light vein.  In fact, Basescu's apparently sincere interest 
in promoting a closer relationship between the two countries 
has both pluses and minuses.  Since taking office, Basescu 
has, by most accounts, improved the climate between the two 
capitals considerably.  Voronin and former Romanian president 
Iliescu, both Communist-era nomenclaturists, had famously 
cool relations.  Bucharest has also actively campaigned 
within the EU and NATO for making Moldova a bigger priority. 
But as elsewhere in the Balkans, old ghosts do not simply go 
away quietly in the night.  The vast majority of Romanians 
probably share Basescu's view that the two countries were 
separated unnaturally.  And one of Basescu's principal 
advisors acknowledged to us privately last week that the 
Romanian president's political program has been built in the 
main on pounding the anti-corruption theme against the Social 
Democrat opposition and stealing the thunder, if not the 
extremism, of the nationalist Greater Romania party. We 
believe Romania can contribute positively to regional 
stability, as it has demonstrated in its Black Sea-oriented 
efforts, but it needs our help in constructively directing 
its energies towards the future horizon, rather than 
backwards over the historical fence.  End Comment. 
 
¶9. Amembassy Bucharest's reporting telegrams are available on 
the Bucharest SIPRNet website: 
www.state.sgov.gov/p/eur/bucharest 
TAUBMAN