The body supervising the privatization of many state controlled companies in Romania suspended its contract with the head of its judicial department after he was retained by anti-graft prosecutors in a bribery case.

Alexandru Mandrut, former counselor at the post-privatization department of the Authority for State Assets Recovery-AVAS who was later named AVAS judicial manager, was arrested on Tuesday for taking bribes amounting to 20,000 USD.

Mandrut is accused of accepting the money given to him by three employees of a Buzau-based company, Gerom SA, offering in exchange to ignore a series of duties that would have had him apply penalties to the firm.