Bucharest / Romania (RNC Agency) 22.02.1997

Romania´s reformist president on Saturday pledged support for France drive to stem illegal immigration but said Romanians schould get equal visa treatment with Czechs, Poles and Hungarians when travelling to the West.

Romania isdetermined to repatrite quickly all those (nationals) who create difficulties in France, Emil Constantinescu told a news conference alonside Jacques Chirac at the end of the French presidents visit. But Constantinescu , elected on centrist opposition ticket last November, said his countrymen schould be allowed to travel to France and other European destinations without visas, like the residents of Eastern Europes more developed nations. Romanians are very touch on this (visa) issue, he said. We will try to find alternative ways to facilitate freedom of movement. France bid to crack down on illegal immigration struck a raw chord among Romanian Roma leaders, who object to tougher rules sought by French Interior Minister Jean-Louis Debre.

I know how important this visit been to boost Romanias hopes to join NATO with French support. But I cant help feeling a little bitter, Nicolae Gheorghe, leader of the Roma Federation, said. In Paris, tens of thousands of artists, intellectuals and left-wing opposition parties marched on Saturday in protest against the draft legislation. We are concerned at what is happening in France lately, with police expelling so-called illegal immigrants, especially Roma, and sending them back to Romania, Gheorghe said.

During his two-day visit, Chirac backed Romanias hopes of intergrating into Western structures and praised the countrys leaders for pledging faster reforms since they ousted ex-communists in elections last November. But he was much more reserved on the prospects of France dropping requirements soon for Romanians. On the visa issue we must go along with European Union procedures, he told the news conference. France this month expelled 29 illegal Romanian immigrants, including 10 who had completed jail terms. It was the 35th chartered flight organised by French authorities, most of wich have been bound for Romania and West and Central Africa part of Debres efforts to stamp out what he says is the changing nature of illegal immigration. Debre, who accompanied Chirac on his visit, signed accords with his Romanian counter-part to tighten police cooperation in fighting illegal immigration, organised crime and terrorism. Bucharest signed a similar repatration deal with Bonn in 1992 to discourage the flow of asylum-seekers in search for better life in the West after the 1989 collapse of communism. Census data show some 400.000 roma live in Romania, but their leaders say the figure is much high.