Political fractures in Romania as the country prepares to join the EU on January 1 next year are the subject of a report in French daily “Le Monde”, according to which the country faces a possible political crises as differences between President Traian Basescu and PM Calin Popescu Tariceanu get deeper and deeper.

Under the headline “Political tensions in Bucharest worry Brussels”, the French newspaper reports that Basescu and Tariceanu defend irreconcilably opposite stands on hot issues currently debated by the Romanian society.

The fight against corruption and the necessity of Romanian troops presence in Iraq are given as samples of the rivalry between the two, a rivalry that is already making victims, the newspaper reports.

It mentions Chief-of Staff Eugen Badalan, recently forced out of office, and Liberal Defense minister Teodor Atanasiu, who followed suit, among the first to fall in this political confrontation.

And “Le Monde” notes that the “new escalation” of the Basescu-Tariceanu conflict has sparked worries in Brussels, where Commissioners Frattini and Rehn send a letter to the Romanian prime minister to show their concern about the events in Romania.

But the French newspaper fails to note that the letter came before key events in the ousting of Badalan and Atanasiu, thus placing it in a different context than it chronologically happened.

Not to mention that the European officials’ letter addressed a different issue than that explained in the French article. The document addressed the failure of the Romanian Parliament to approve key provisions of a law aimed at strengthening checks on the wealth of public officials as a means of combating corruption.