Romanian newspapers return after Easter break on Tuesday with a series of reports about politicians reconsidering their plans to suspend President Traian Basescu, about Romania’s milder terms regarding the withdrawal of its troops from Iraq, about how Romania and Bulgaria are warring for tourists and how the celebration of Easter has been changing.

Evenimentul Zilei reports that the planned suspension of the President will not take place this week as expected because the Parliament has yet to receive the necessary approval from the Constitutional Court to start the procedures.

The news come as parliamentary parties are reconsidering their stance towards President Traian Basescu after PM Calin Popescu Tariceanu forced through a new minority government with support from the opposition, leaving the head of state without political support for any of his initiatives.

According to Cotidianul, three opposition parties - the Social Democrats, the Conservative Party and the Greater Romania Party - are no longer clear in their statements about their plans to suspend the President.

Still, Adevarul reports that only the latter is expected to step back from its moves against Basescu.

One possible reason for reconsidering the procedure is given by Romania libera, which reports that Mircea Geoana, leader of the Social Democrats, has blamed the party’s constitutional expert Antonie Iorgovan of badly documenting a statement in which Basescu is accused of breaching the Romanian Constitution.

The Constitutional Court last week decided that Basescu has breached the Constitution, but not in a manner that would request his suspension.

Meanwhile, newspapers discuss Liberal moves to withdraw Romania’s troops from Iraq, as promised by PM Calin Popescu Tariceanu before forming an almost exclusively Liberal government.

According to Gandul, new Defense minister Teodor Melescanu is more cautious than the prime minister in this regard as he announced yesterday that Romanian troops would be withdrawn from Iraq only after consultations with the allies.

According to Cotidianul, Melescanu made the statement while on a visit to Iraq, where he met Romanian troops and coalition officials.

Elsewhere in the papers, Evenimentul Zilei describes in a feature article how the traditional Easter service has been perverted by technology, with priests running play back sermons on malfunctioning amplifiers.

That comes after a week of people trampling each other in Bucharest hypermarkets and prior to traditional visits to the resting places of the dear ones in the city cemeteries - where Gypsy music and ad-hoc picnics rule supreme.

Cotidianul tackles Easter from a different perspective: throngs of Romanians flocked to Bulgarian seaside resorts for the Easter holiday, while Romania’s own Black Sea resorts remained deserted.

That, according to Evenimentul Zilei, prefaces an all-out tourism war between the two countries for the traditional May 1 leave as the Romanian seaside hopes for nothing more than visiting students, while the “working class” is expected to opt for Bulgaria.

Also in newspapers today:

• Adevarul and Cotidianul quote Austrian newspaper Der Standard according to which the pace of reform in Romania and Bulgaria is slower than the pace of political elites accumulating fortunes.

The paper writes that the two newest members of the European Union continue to face the old pains of corruption and dependence on economic oligarchs.

• Romania libera publishes an interview with Peter Bishop, chief architect of London, who warned that Bucharest should not consider competing with Paris or other Western capitals in terms of urban organization, but rather with Sofia and Budapest.

According to Bishop, Bucharest is a beautiful city that has been destroyed and mutilated but still shows off its history.

• Cotidianul quotes a lawyer for Ioan Pacepa, the US-based ex-head of communist Romania’s secret police, the Securitate, who dismissed media reports that Pacepa was about to arrange a meeting for Romanian maverick businessman-politician Gigi Becali with US vice-president Dick Cheney.

Pacepa says he does not know Becali and that he will never campaign for any Romanian politician.