Monday, October 20 2003: The British company Balkan Petroleum was established by Romanians

Paul Cristian Radu paulradu@crji.org

The general director of the British company that received from Corneliu Iacobov over 74 million shares of the Rafo Onesti refinery is a woman who lives in Bucharest, in the Tei neighborhood.

Last week we have published a series of investigations regarding the Rafo refinery and they “modus operandi” that left a huge financial hole in the Romanian economy. In fact, Rafo Onesti owes thousands of billion lei to the national budget. Right after we have published the articles, Corneliu Iacobov, the owner of Rafo, declared that half of the Rafo Onesti, including debts to the state, was given (not sold) to the Balkan Petroleum(BP), a company from London, England. Together with the shares, the BP took half of the 10,000 billion lei debt that Rafo owes to the State. Despite the fact that the Rafo shares and debts transaction have a serious impact on Romania’s economy, the authorities refused to reveal who are the owners of the BP company. We have, however, managed to get the documents that prove the BP is controlled by a Romanian group.

The Authorities Keep Secret Public Interest Information When we have officially inquired about the owners of the BP, the Privatization Authority (APAPS) invoked the commercial secrecy and refused to tell who the owners of half of the Rafo debts to the State are. The APAPS position is at least dubious, taking into account that a county in Romania supports its economy on the Rafo refinery.

The British from Bucharest

Our reporters found out that the names involved in the BP company from Tabernacle Street, London, lead us no further than the Tei neighborhood in Bucharest, Romania. This is the area where one of the two directors of the BP lives.
According to British Commercial Registry documents, BP director Liana Radu, 35, is an engineer from Bucharest. She is not involved in any other commercial enterprise in Romania.

Waiting for a Package

In October’s first week, we have decided to pay a visit at the address of BP’s director. She lives in a block of flats and we had to ring at the front entrance in order to speak to whoever was living there. Seconds after we rang a woman’s voice answered. We told her that we are looking for Liana Radu and that we need to talk to her about Rafo Onesti and Balkan Petroleum. She didn’t let us finish our sentence and asked if we have a package for her from Paul Ivascu, the current Rafo general director. We told her that we’re journalists, we don’t have such a package but that we need to speak to her. She opened the building’s front door and invited us to go upstairs to the 6th floor. Here she was already waiting for us in front of the door, speaking on her cell phone. Her conversation partner was Paul Ivascu, the Rafo director. Suddenly, she turned blue. She told us that Mr. Ivascu doesn’t know about us. Then she handed us the phone and we had the chance of speaking to Rafo’s owner, who has declined so many times before to talk to us on the Rafo subject. Mr. Ivascu was not very talkative this time, too. He told us he has nothing to declare. In the meantime, the women who identified herself as Liana Radu started shouting at us. “Who told you about the British company?” Liana Radu said. Afterwards, when we handed back the mobile phone, she asked Paul Ivascu what should she do: “Should I call the boss? How did they find out?”. She, then, told us to leave the building and kept on asking what is our source of information on this case.

Rafo: No comment

Our meeting with Liana Radu, the BP’s director, proved that behind the Rafo debts transaction hides a Romanian group. We have tried the following day to contact Paul Ivascu, the Rafo director, again but his secretary told us he is busy.
To be continued.