Bucharest suspends Blue Air's OL

Bucharest court halts prison sentence of ex-Blue Air owner

An appeals court in Bucharest has ordered the termination of a criminal case against businessman and former Blue Air (Romania) (BLA, Bucharest Henri Coanda) owner Nelu Iordache, cancelling a 12-and-a-half-year prison sentence he was given for alleged embezzlement at the airline, the Romanian news agency Agerpres reported.

Iordache was arrested and charged with embezzlement in April 2013, linked to an attempt to sell the then loss-making carrier; to “tax evasion in a continuous form”; and to his allegedly adding fictitious purchases of advertising materials in the accounts. Romania’s anticorruption watchdog (Direcția Națională Anticorupție - DNA) sent the case to court in June 2018, and the entrepreneur received his sentence in March 2021.

However, in their ruling this week, judges at the Bucharest Court of Appeal maintained that the facts through which Iordache was accused had expired, pointing to a decision (no. 358/2022) taken at the Constitutional Court of Romania last May. That decision declared as unconstitutional, an article in the criminal code that allowed prosecutors to interrupt ongoing cases by administering new evidence, a regulation...

Romania’s Blue Air loses US investor, debts may top €250mn

Romanian taxman seizes six Blue Air aircraft

Bucharest nationalises Blue Air, mulls sale to US investor

The Romanian state has taken over Blue Air (Romania) (BLA, Bucharest Henri Coanda), confiscating a 75% stake in the dormant carrier - just as media reports revealed one month ago that it would.

“We have taken over the shares, the takeover has been completed, and now we are trying to form a new board of directors. The people who are now on the board have not resigned yet, but they will,” said Daniel Geantă, head of the Authority for the Administration of State Assets (Autoritatea pentru Administrarea Activelor Statului - AAAS), told the Romanian-language news site Economica.net.

“It’s that delivery-reception period and we have had problems accessing the documents, and there are small delays due to the fact that the documents we requested are not being made available to us,” he added.

The state institution is requiring the closure of the airline’s financial statements and employment contracts, as well as a statement of debts and creditors, and soon the AAAS will embark on a full audit of the company.

Blue Air accumulated debts...