Dragnea released from prison: Two years of torment and suffering; ferocious dictatorship in today's Romania

Former national leader of the Social Democratic Party (PSD) Liviu Dragnea was released from the Rahova Penitentiary on Thursday after serving more than two and a half years of a three-and-a-half-year sentence received in 2019 in the case of fictitious employment at the Teleorman child protection agency.

Dragnea said that the time he spent in prison was "torment" and "suffering," claiming that in Romania today there is "ferocious dictatorship."

"Two years of torment and suffering. Abuse, suffering and most of the people today have understood why I had to get here. When I left, Romania was a prosperous country, with high incomes earned by Romanians, a country where there was hope, there was a future. Unfortunately, today, it is ferocious dictatorship; freedom of expression is seriously affected, Romania's future is mortgaged with such debts," Dragnea said after leaving prison.

The Giurgiu Court on Thursday approved a request for conditional release from prison submitted by Dragnea after serving more than two years of a sentence of three and a half years received in 2019 in the case of fake jobs.

Bucharest District 5 Court Dragnea denied Dragnea's request but he filed an appeal that the Giurgiu Tribunal agreed to take up on Thursday.

Initially, Dragnea's appeal was filed with the Bucharest Tribunal, which denied his request, but he managed to move the trial to Giurgiu on the grounds that judges in Bucharest cannot be impartial in considering his request because they had signed a petition to amend justice legislation when PSD was at rule.