We leave behind a huge political investment of trust and hope on behalf of our people. It would all however have been in vain unless we will show pos… - Traian Băsescu

Imported from the USSR, the communist ideology justified the assault against civil society, against political and economic pluralism; it justified the annihilation of the democratic parties, the destruction of the free market, extermination by assassination, deportations, forced labor, and the imprisonment of hundreds of thousands of people. Behind the mask of "socialist humanism" lay concealed the most profound contempt for human beings as individuals.

My country's particular experience in Southeastern Europe and the wider Black Sea area reveals that meaningful cooperation between the U.N. and regional organizations is decisive both on conflict management, and in handling responses to transnational non-conventional threats.

I confess that Mrs. Thatcher was a model for me personally. She always applied the principles of law and economic liberalism, and that is how I, as a President who had to face the challenges of a post-communist country, will remember the legacy of Thatcherism.