Romania still spies on foreigners
“Not welcome.”
Romania should post this sign on it’s borders.
After World War II, the United States and Britain carved up Europe and delivered half on a plate to the Soviet Union in order to placate Stalin. Almost overnight, millions of people were sold out by the Allies and shackled in the chains of communism. In these dark days, Romania had the most extensive secret police force in the Eastern Bloc. They called it Securitate… and Romanians still maintain a healthy fear of the very word, even today.
Securitate were known for all manner of brutual atrocities against their comrade citizens. The black-shirted thugs were carefully studious of all foreigners in Romania, tapping their telephones and following their movements. In 1989, Securitate were instrumental in manufacturing the fake “revolution” where dictator-for-life Ceauşescu was usurped by his own communist party and promptly executed live on television.
The government changed its name. It refused to call itself communist, although nothing else changed. The same communist leaders kept firm control of Romania while the public relations machine worked overtime to spread the propoganda of a “people’s revolution for democracy.” They rushed to slap together a hodge-podge constitution. And they changed the name of Securitate.
Re-branded as SRI, the same secret police went about their dirty work of keeping the people in line. They also continued to tap the telephones and monitor the activites of all foreigners. SRI enabled Communist Party leaders and Securitate members to gain control of major industries as state properties became privitized. Today, most Romanian millionaires are former SRI agents or top communist politicians.
Ion Iliescu is the scumbag who made this all possible.
As a prominent leader of communist youth throughout the 1940s, 50s, and 60s, Ion Iliescu was deeply involved with key figures of the Romanian Communist Party during their most impressionable years. When breaking ranks with the USSR, Ceauşescu demoted Iliescu in 1971 and kept him and other pro-Moscovites sidelined in harmless political positions.
You can imagine Iliescu’s taste for revenge. He got it in 1989 by orchestrating his old buddies to foist a pretend revolution and seized power. Iliescu changed the name of the Communist Party to the Socialist Party (PSD). He has been President of Romania most of the years since then. Ion paid all his SRI and PSD friends back by making them millionaires in the corrupt new order.
Times change, of course. Because of the extraordinary circumstances of Soviet-communist intervention in the elections of Ukraine that sparked worldwide attention during the Orange Revolution in 2004, the people of Romania caught a lucky break. Ion Iliescu’s PSD party had been, once again, rigging elections in Romania in order to secure their control of the country and make sure the money kept flowing to their informal cartel.
But with the media attention in Ukraine, the rightfully-elected candidate waved his arms in the air, jumping up and down, screaming, to get the attention of western journalists. Fortunately, they gave him some. International observers came in and declared PSD the loser. Finally, Romania got a chance for real freedom.
Currently, the government is proposing to demilitarize SRI and turn it into a civil servant institution. As the debates are had in political circles, some interesting facts surfaced and were publicly aired. SRI continues its Securitate legacy by tapping the telephones of foreigners.
In fact, it has been disclosed SRI tapped 6,370 telephones in 2005 so they could track the communications of 2,373 people. Yes, that’s an average of 3 phones per person. Home, business, and mobile phone. Approximately 80% are foreign citizens.
Why does SRI actively spy on foreign persons? There’s not a proliferation of terrorist activity in Romania nor any real threat of it.
Most likely, it’s corruption. Sure, they’re going to bug the phones of a few important political dignitaries and such, but there’s still a strong culture of SRI spying on foreign (and domestic!) businessmen in order to supply information to their PSD friends. You know, keep them a step ahead of the competition. Money. The more things change, the more they stay the same.
While no doubt well intentioned, President Basescu tries to put a spin on it by touting the “national security” meme. It is, however, a bit problematic to try and attract foreign investment in Romania while you’re tapping telephones to undermine the competition. Companies generally research well during the due diligence phase of investment. They know about the corrupt PSD mafia and it’s strong ties to SRI. And they know they’ll be spied on.
Romania may as well put a “Not Welcome” sign along its border to deter economic growth. I suppose it’s nice to see the government at least talks about it openly. If you’d like to discuss the impact of these policies, just give me a call…
