Romanian PM will not be investigated for plagiarism, after court rejects appeal

Romanian Prime Minister Victor Ponta will not be investigated for plagiarism, after the High Court of Cassation and Justice (ICCJ) rejected on Monday (March 17) the appeal filed by the authors of the initial complaint, Adrian Papahagi, Mihail Neamtu and Augustin Ofiteru. The court’s decision is final, according to news agency Agerpres. In May 2013, prosecutors from the High Court of Justice decided not to start criminal proceedings in the case of a complaint in which Victor Ponta was accused of plagiarism. However, the authors of this complaint, namely Adrian Papahagi, Mihail Neamtu and Augustin Ofiteru, challenged the prosecutors’ decision in court. In August 2012, Papahagi, Neamtu and Ofiteru submitted to the High Court of Cassation and Justice Prosecutor’s Office a criminal complaint against Victor Ponta for plagiarism. This accusation referred to the work Liability in international humanitarian law, published in 2010 and signed by Victor Ponta. They said that Ponta’s work allegedly contained 113 pages copied from the works of other authors. Irina Popescu, irina.popescu@romania-insider.com