Open Letter of Prof. Ion Diaconu, translated in English

Written by Marian Achim 

Given that this letter arrived yesterday at around 4:07 p.m. and published on RTV.ro being the source, that charges made by Ms. Monica Macovei, President Traian Basescu, the Presidential Adviser Funeriu (without assuming identity that made charges on the Newspaper Nature), B1 TV (television trying to destroy a man and not try to counter-argue one way or another as that is not plagiarism) and the last Realitatea TV, continues to play dirty's Basescu game launched, therefore i give in your attention the open letter of Prof. Ion Diaconu. Please read the following:

To: 

Traian Basescu - President of Romania (in future SUSPENDED)

Monica Macovei - (hopefully charges for defamation)

The News Paper Nature (The News paper that gives for free to read to all the world when it is about the person who aren't likely for Mr. President of Romania)

To Brussels (hopefully they have open mind and they can see the real truth).

Open Letter

I have found these days, to make very serious allegations about a possible plagiarism committed by the Prime Minister of Romania, Mr Victor Ponta, in his doctoral work on the International Criminal Court. Allegations, anonymous, were published in Nature and have been widely taken in Romania and in some Western countries.

As a person directly involved without my will in this matter - are, after all, one of those who were presented as victims of alleged plagiarism - I want to do, by this letter, several explanations.

First of all, our names is unfortunate involvement in the scandal and we do not recognize any of his allegations.

Secondly, with full responsibility, in front if you that this work is not plagiarized, the work that I signed it. I do not think my work has been plagiarized in the dissertation of Mr. Ponta, which can be easily evaluated by experts in law. Presentation of disparate parts, without clear indication of the context and without taking into account the specific works of law, are clear signs of negative intentions, meant only to support media unfounded attack. When treating a subject that is very strict legal terms, as is the case, that involves describing how to set up an international court of justice, of its jurisdiction, the investigation procedure that applies Court prosecutor and court procedure applied during the public phase of the process, original author is largely excluded. Anyone who takes such a theme, which has been treated previously, can not play the basic documents - Statute of the Court, elements of crimes, reports of international organizations who have treated this problem - and actually put in a position to play some phrases and paragraphs from of these documents and will certainly be found in other papers on this topic. In this context, in terms of the art of writing a doctoral thesis, does not require passage in the footer of previous authors who have treated an identical theme being used is sufficient reference to sources at the end of a chapter or in the general bibliography and Annexes presented.

Thirdly, i recall that the thesis is focused on the International Criminal Court and was developed shortly after the establishment of this institution. From what I know, Mr. Ponta was part of the team who worked on the negotiation status of this Court, being appointed for that purpose by the Public Ministry in Romania (Prosecutor General). There is no reason to plagiarize other authors, given participation in these activities.

Fourth, those who were part of the committee that assessed and supported doctoral work are renowned professors, and made all supporting papers for the title of doctor in one of the most important Romanian universities, University Bucharest.

Fifth, Mr. Ponta was accused of plagiarism in the thesis content, a paper signed by me. I mention that the preface to the published edition of the thesis to be written by me. In this preface, I appreciated the quality and content of work and we welcome its appearance in legal literature in Romania.

Sixth, our work, which is said to have been the inspiration for plagiarism were mentioned in the bibliography, in thesis, in accordance with academic rules in force at the date of the thesis.

From my point of view, Mr. Ponta complied with all academic rules and laws regarding this thesis. At the time of writing the thesis, the law regulating this area was Law no. 8/1996 on copyright and related rights, which regulate unauthorized reproduction. The dissertation citations were made in compliance with this law. Also, in retrospect, thesis respect and Art 4 (1)letter d, of Law 206 of 27 May 2004 on good conduct in scientific research, technological development and innovation that defines plagiarism as "exposure in a work written or oral communication, including electronic, of texts, phrases, ideas, demos, data, assumptions, theories, results, or excerpts from works by scientific methods, including electronic form, other authors, not to mention this and without refers to the original sources "

As noted and the Court of Appeal and confirmed by the decision ICCJ Civil No 1978/2008, the content of legislation are not subject to copyright under Article 9, letter b of Law 8/1996. This is very important because all plagiarized text made ​​public as nothing more than reproductions of international documents, reports of international institutions or regulations.

The same decision held that copyright infringement can be studied only in terms of copyright holder. In other words, should the person alleged to be the authors original work to support the existence of plagiarism, which is obviously not the case.

According ICCJ decision, Civil and Intellectual Property Section, No. 8/2011, "both medical language, and legal language, are characterized by uniformity, they can not be used differently, but just claiming a use by users". As such, the legal field is based largely on the nature of normative sources, the texts. Any paper documents and then starts to follow the views expressed in the literature and personal interpretations. Therefore, literature that talks about the common case, given that is used by all authors.

I think these issues are important to better inform the public and academics, as well as rejection of obvious false accusations.

I trust that you will consider this point of view.

With great appreciation

Prof. Ion Diaconu