President Nicusor Dan's statement that journalist Ovidiu Vanghele would be barred from attending his press conferences was discussed on Wednesday at a meeting of the National Audiovisual Council (CNA).

CNA member Dorina Rusu said that 'the law expressly stipulates that no authority may prohibit journalists from attending presidential events and press conferences'.

'If he wrote something about the president on Facebook, there would have been another setting in which an explanation could have been given and the matter discussed, rather than during a press conference, with the journalist subsequently being barred from attending future press conferences. The law expressly stipulates that no authority may prohibit journalists from attending presidential events and press conferences, because the Cotroceni Palace is not the president's property. It is the seat of an institution, and that institution organises events which any journalist has the right to attend, provided they do not engage in attacks or other serious conduct that could interfere with or disrupt the institution's activities or endanger public order,' Rusu said.

She described the president's statements as 'a dangerous precedent'.

'From this perspective, I believe this sets a dangerous precedent, and I am also speaking as a representative and member of an institution that needs to cooperate with the presidential institution on certain projects. I hope we will cooperate with the Presidency on projects concerning the protection of freedom of expression and, of course, disinformation, but that also involves defending freedom of expression, rather than projects that prevent journalists from doing their jobs or lead towards censorship and practices we do not agree with. Of course, we have sometimes been accused of censorship ourselves, but that is not what we do. I consider this a dangerous precedent, and I would like us to cooperate with an institution that understands and respects these rules,' Dorina Rusu added.

For his part, Georgica Severin said he considered 'far more serious' a statement by the Romanian president that 'nowadays, fair elections are no longer about counting votes correctly but, in a way, about how citizens form their opinions'.

'What happened is indeed quite serious and points to a certain understanding not only of press freedom and freedom of expression, but also of compliance with existing legislation. Under Law 544, journalists have free access to events organised by public institutions. There must therefore be reasons of an entirely different nature to prohibit access. Obviously, I would like us to apply the same standards to this situation as we would if, for example, the leader of a political party had excluded a journalist from such a press conference. But what I find far more serious than what happened to my fellow townsman Ovidiu Vanghele, who is from Campina, is a statement the president made a few days ago, when he said that nowadays fair elections are no longer about counting votes correctly but, in a way, about how citizens form their opinions. I believe that if we start controlling how citizens form their opinions, we can no longer speak of free elections under any circumstances. That is why I believe our role as the National Audiovisual Council is to ensure compliance with the law, but also to safeguard the plurality of ideas, diversity of expression and respect for journalists' dignity and freedom,' Georgica Severin stressed.

Lucian Dindirica expressed the view that the president had said he 'no longer wanted that journalist' at his press conferences, rather than at all events held at the Cotroceni Palace.

'I will just say a few words about how I understood the situation. I think we saw things differently. I believe the president simply no longer wants that journalist at his own press conferences. I don't think this means he will no longer be able to work with the Presidential Administration, because that would be the really serious issue. So I don't know whether he has been completely barred from events organised by the Presidential Administration at the Cotroceni Palace or only from the president's press conferences during his term in office. You probably need to make a very clear distinction here. On the other hand, from what I have read, as I don't follow that particular journalist, I understand that he directed some extremely, extremely offensive insults at the president. Personal insults,' Lucian Dindirica said.

Monica Gubernat, a former CNA president, considered that the entire press conference at the Cotroceni Palace had been marked by 'a great deal of aggression'.

'I never expected to find myself defending the president, but what I saw at Cotroceni, throughout that entire press conference, was a great deal of aggression. And if we consider the right to insult people to be equivalent to the right to freedom of expression, then we have no business being members of the CNA,' Monica Gubernat said.

President Nicusor Dan said on Tuesday evening, at the end of a press briefing at the Cotroceni Presidential Palace, that journalist Ovidiu Vanghele would no longer be allowed to attend his press conferences because of insults he had directed at the president. AGERPRES (RO - writing by: Daniel Popescu; EN - writing by: Simona Iacob)