8 ms·

This isn't a parody, right? I mean, surely no-one would (seriously) say this in public in real life? Right?

yankput 3y ago
The Serbian community in Kosovo kind of ignores all laws. Up until recently they basically had free/stolem electricity and they used it to mine bitcoin for free.
martin1975 3y ago
It's not. I come from that area. He's telling the truth.
- zgluck 3y ago
  Yes. That is also why we need to keep Kosovo out of the EU until this has been fixed - which I'm pretty sure won't happen any time soon :(.
  - yankput 3y ago
    Well we first need to fix the tensions with Serbia, which is impossible.
  - CSMastermind 3y ago
    I've heard similar things about Romania and Bulgaria which are both EU countries.
    - izacus 3y ago
      Plenty of things are "heard" with dubious truthfulness.
      - smcin 3y ago
        Corruption Perceptions Index data has been documenting this for decades: * 2000: Bulgaria 3.5/10, Romania 2.9/10 https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2000 https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2000 * 2007: Bulgaria 4.1/10, Romania 3.7/10 https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2007 https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2007 * 2013: Bulgaria 41/100, Romania 43/100 https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2013 https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2013 * 2022: Bulgaria 43/100, Romania 46/100, Western Europe and EU average: 66 https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2022 https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2022 "2022 Corruption Perceptions Index Reveals Undue Influence And Fragmented Anti-Corruption Efforts Threaten Progress In Western Europe & EU": https://www.transparency.org/en/press/2022-corruption-perceptions-index-reveals-undue-influence-fragmented-anticorruption-threaten-progress-western-europe-eu https://www.transparency.org/en/press/2022-corruption-percep...
    - mhitza 3y ago
      Romania has high levels of corruption, but when we entered the EU we had high levels of overt corruption. I'll never forget during the presidential elections of early 2010s (or around that time) (we joined EU in 2007) when a member of the loosing party (which would then become our prime minister), Victor Ponta, stated frankly, in an interview, that they lost because his party stole fewer votes (bribing the poor with meager amounts of household products to vote for them, which is a favorite campaign activity around here). However to combat this prolific corruption (in part because of EU mandate), around the same time, our winning president instated the National Anticorruption Directorate (DNA in Romanian) which is a "taskforce" of judges and lawyers investigating these highly profilic cases. It became moderately successful (there's always room for improvement). The EU took note, and brought in members of the directorate to instate a similar structure centrally as an EU institution (for cross border corruption cases), and afaik the process has been set in motion to instate the same directorare in Bulgaria (under the guide of a certain prosecution attorney that lead this directorare in Romania, Laura Codruta Kovesi).
      - ChoHag 3y ago
        [dead]
      - optimalsolver 3y ago
        *losing Just FYI.
      - OfSanguineFire 3y ago
        Whenever foreigners bring corruption in Romania, I try to emphasize that while it exists, it is no longer very visible unless you are in fairly high-level business and politics. There was a time when everyone on the bus had to contribute 5€ when crossing the border, so that the customs officials wouldn’t go through everyone’s luggage. A time when you couldn’t register a sole proprietorship without at least offering the clerk some chocolate or whatever as a token bribe. But that all disappeared about 2006 and life in Romania is little different from Western EU states.
    - Longhanks 3y ago
      Corruption is also common practice within the EU (see: Eva Kaili), most of the upper EU just hides it better while pointing fingers at "unaligned" states, inside and outside of the EU. If Von der Leyen wasn’t corrupt, I’m sure she wouldn’t have any problem handing over her texts.
      - worrycue 3y ago
        > If Von der Leyen wasn’t corrupt, I’m sure she wouldn’t have any problem handing over her texts. Haven’t found much on this. Frankly there is no need to allege corruption against this particular EU politician when there are better examples like those involved with the Qatar scandal.
      - chewz 3y ago
        > If Von der Leyen wasn’t corrupt, I’m sure she wouldn’t have any problem handing over her texts. Are you talking about Pfizer related text messages or earlier German MoD/McKinsey text messages?
      - mvanbaak 3y ago
        > wouldn’t have any problem handing over her texts This is the same non-reason as is being brought up with cameras filming you 24/7 etc. 'You dont have to worry if you have nothing to hide' ... It's an invasion of privacy, and it is worth fighting against that.
        dghlsakjg 3y ago
        Being forced to share correspondence related to your job as a public official seems different to exposing your entire life to a camera.
        brightlancer 3y ago
        Was she acting as a private individual or as a government official? Government has ZERO right to privacy; government agents in their capacity have ZERO right to privacy. If a government agent uses a private account to do government business, then a) they should be fired/ removed and charged for trying to hide that business and b) those accounts should be turned over to the government, redacted of anything not related to the government business, and everything else made public. A private individual has a right to privacy. Government, including anyone acting as its agent, do not.
- marcinzm 3y ago
  His statement being factual and his statement, admitting to breaking laws in Kosovo, being a rational thing to say publicly are different things.
  - coldtea 3y ago
    It's perfectly rational if nobody cares about the laws being broken there, and they will have no repurcursion for admitting to it.
    - krisoft 3y ago
      Not at all. Admiting it publicly has all kind of repercussions internationaly even if there are none locally.
      - freehorse 3y ago
        They cannot be arrested in Croatia or anywhere else for breaking laws in Kosovo.
        marcinzm 3y ago
        Bribery is illegal in many countries including specifically the bribing of foreign public officials including in Croatia.
        ZiiS 3y ago
        Most banks etc will cut business even if you cannot be arested.
        Ms-J 3y ago
        Thankfully there are alternatives to banks when they try to dictate, such as cryptocurrency or even Hawala. I've used both with great success.
    - marcinzm 3y ago
      There being no immediate repercussions doesn't mean there aren't going to be any long term when you basically give governments a loaded gun aimed at your own head. Eventually someone might decide to use it even if the reason for it has nothing to do with the gun. This is a person who, by their own statement, had out of context IRC logs used by the government to convict him of a different crime.
skilled 3y ago
It sounds like you have never been to a country where money can buy anything you want, including freedom. Many such countries in the world.
- AwaAwa 3y ago
  You mean all, it's just the amount that differs.
- lb1lf 3y ago
  Well, money will only buy you freedom in such places until you annoy someone with deeper pockets than you have sufficiently so that they want you to wind up behind bars. Corruption is an equal opportunity weapon.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]
  - skilled 3y ago
    Sure, but that’s in extreme cases. For small stuff like papers, permits and such - talking to the right people will get you anywhere you want to go. I still remember handing over my passport to a guy on a sports bike in Singapore to get an extended stamp for Indonesia, and only a few years later did it occur to me how sketchy the whole situation was.
- dale_glass 3y ago
  Such countries exist, but as this case and Andrew Tate show, actually putting it in such frank terms may not be a good idea. Yeah, maybe you can buy yourself out of trouble. But I suspect in many such cases the people involved prefer to be bought quietly. Make things too uncomfortably public or too embarrassing and the same people might well throw the book at you.
  - skilled 3y ago
    I don’t know the specifics of his case but it is my understanding that EU isn’t as easily bought as South America or Southeast Asia for example. The latter has a system that doesn’t “include” foreigners, whereas someplace like Romania is a lot more Westernized and offering a bribe carries a lot more risk.
bcye 3y ago
Parody, honeypot, maybe both
- tedivm 3y ago
  Seriously- I feel like I was just added to several government watch lists simply for opening that page.
sgjohnson 3y ago
I know the guy. No, it’s not a parody.
mschuster91 3y ago
Andrew Tate said essentially the same. Turns out corrupt police don't like it when someone brags with that fact. Not that I'd shed any tear for Tate or the other guy though, both deserve all they get and more.
- chx 3y ago
  Here's what Tate said on The Fellas podcast: > I like living in countries where corruption is accessible for everybody. The emphasis here was on everybody because this followed a rant about how Western societies are corrupt where the rich gets to ignore the laws and he wanted to do the same. He said this in 2022 so whether he really did move in 2017 for this reason is impossible to say.
- soco 3y ago
  Tate is also arrested currently, so looks like this kind of "honesty" has a price. And in general I'm pretty sure that bribery even when done abroad would get you in trouble in your own country, so I'm quite surprised by such statements put like that in the open.
- dudeinjapan 3y ago
  [flagged]
  - Ms-J 3y ago
    "especially when we offend" This is a fundamental premise of freedom of speech and a large reason as to why it exists. For some reason your comment was flagged, I vouched and voted it up.
    - hotdogscout 3y ago
      Thank you! This happens way too often here, thoughtful arguments being flagged because a few with enough karma believe socialist ideals are mandatory.
    - sudosysgen 3y ago
      I don't find that comment objectionable because it is in favour of freedom of speech, I find it objectionable because it pretends someone with multiple credible allegations of rape and associates who admit to using violence to incite women into sex crimes, who admitted to running illegal casinos and who says he moved to Romania because he doesn't have to follow the law is only in legal trouble because people disagree with his ideas and has done nothing illegal that would warrant charges.

The Serbian community in Kosovo kind of ignores all laws. Up until recently they basically had free/stolem electricity and they used it to mine bitcoin for free.

martin1975 3y ago

It's not. I come from that area. He's telling the truth.

zgluck 3y ago
Yes. That is also why we need to keep Kosovo out of the EU until this has been fixed - which I'm pretty sure won't happen any time soon :(.
- yankput 3y ago
  Well we first need to fix the tensions with Serbia, which is impossible.
- CSMastermind 3y ago
  I've heard similar things about Romania and Bulgaria which are both EU countries.
  - izacus 3y ago
    Plenty of things are "heard" with dubious truthfulness.
    - smcin 3y ago
      Corruption Perceptions Index data has been documenting this for decades: * 2000: Bulgaria 3.5/10, Romania 2.9/10 https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2000 https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2000 * 2007: Bulgaria 4.1/10, Romania 3.7/10 https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2007 https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2007 * 2013: Bulgaria 41/100, Romania 43/100 https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2013 https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2013 * 2022: Bulgaria 43/100, Romania 46/100, Western Europe and EU average: 66 https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2022 https://www.transparency.org/en/cpi/2022 "2022 Corruption Perceptions Index Reveals Undue Influence And Fragmented Anti-Corruption Efforts Threaten Progress In Western Europe & EU": https://www.transparency.org/en/press/2022-corruption-perceptions-index-reveals-undue-influence-fragmented-anticorruption-threaten-progress-western-europe-eu https://www.transparency.org/en/press/2022-corruption-percep...
  - mhitza 3y ago
    Romania has high levels of corruption, but when we entered the EU we had high levels of overt corruption. I'll never forget during the presidential elections of early 2010s (or around that time) (we joined EU in 2007) when a member of the loosing party (which would then become our prime minister), Victor Ponta, stated frankly, in an interview, that they lost because his party stole fewer votes (bribing the poor with meager amounts of household products to vote for them, which is a favorite campaign activity around here). However to combat this prolific corruption (in part because of EU mandate), around the same time, our winning president instated the National Anticorruption Directorate (DNA in Romanian) which is a "taskforce" of judges and lawyers investigating these highly profilic cases. It became moderately successful (there's always room for improvement). The EU took note, and brought in members of the directorate to instate a similar structure centrally as an EU institution (for cross border corruption cases), and afaik the process has been set in motion to instate the same directorare in Bulgaria (under the guide of a certain prosecution attorney that lead this directorare in Romania, Laura Codruta Kovesi).
    - ChoHag 3y ago
      [dead]
    - optimalsolver 3y ago
      *losing Just FYI.
    - OfSanguineFire 3y ago
      Whenever foreigners bring corruption in Romania, I try to emphasize that while it exists, it is no longer very visible unless you are in fairly high-level business and politics. There was a time when everyone on the bus had to contribute 5€ when crossing the border, so that the customs officials wouldn’t go through everyone’s luggage. A time when you couldn’t register a sole proprietorship without at least offering the clerk some chocolate or whatever as a token bribe. But that all disappeared about 2006 and life in Romania is little different from Western EU states.
  - Longhanks 3y ago
    Corruption is also common practice within the EU (see: Eva Kaili), most of the upper EU just hides it better while pointing fingers at "unaligned" states, inside and outside of the EU. If Von der Leyen wasn’t corrupt, I’m sure she wouldn’t have any problem handing over her texts.
    - worrycue 3y ago
      > If Von der Leyen wasn’t corrupt, I’m sure she wouldn’t have any problem handing over her texts. Haven’t found much on this. Frankly there is no need to allege corruption against this particular EU politician when there are better examples like those involved with the Qatar scandal.
    - chewz 3y ago
      > If Von der Leyen wasn’t corrupt, I’m sure she wouldn’t have any problem handing over her texts. Are you talking about Pfizer related text messages or earlier German MoD/McKinsey text messages?
    - mvanbaak 3y ago
      > wouldn’t have any problem handing over her texts This is the same non-reason as is being brought up with cameras filming you 24/7 etc. 'You dont have to worry if you have nothing to hide' ... It's an invasion of privacy, and it is worth fighting against that.
      - dghlsakjg 3y ago
        Being forced to share correspondence related to your job as a public official seems different to exposing your entire life to a camera.
      - brightlancer 3y ago
        Was she acting as a private individual or as a government official? Government has ZERO right to privacy; government agents in their capacity have ZERO right to privacy. If a government agent uses a private account to do government business, then a) they should be fired/ removed and charged for trying to hide that business and b) those accounts should be turned over to the government, redacted of anything not related to the government business, and everything else made public. A private individual has a right to privacy. Government, including anyone acting as its agent, do not.
marcinzm 3y ago
His statement being factual and his statement, admitting to breaking laws in Kosovo, being a rational thing to say publicly are different things.
- coldtea 3y ago
  It's perfectly rational if nobody cares about the laws being broken there, and they will have no repurcursion for admitting to it.
  - krisoft 3y ago
    Not at all. Admiting it publicly has all kind of repercussions internationaly even if there are none locally.
    - freehorse 3y ago
      They cannot be arrested in Croatia or anywhere else for breaking laws in Kosovo.
      - marcinzm 3y ago
        Bribery is illegal in many countries including specifically the bribing of foreign public officials including in Croatia.
      - ZiiS 3y ago
        Most banks etc will cut business even if you cannot be arested.
        Ms-J 3y ago
        Thankfully there are alternatives to banks when they try to dictate, such as cryptocurrency or even Hawala. I've used both with great success.
  - marcinzm 3y ago
    There being no immediate repercussions doesn't mean there aren't going to be any long term when you basically give governments a loaded gun aimed at your own head. Eventually someone might decide to use it even if the reason for it has nothing to do with the gun. This is a person who, by their own statement, had out of context IRC logs used by the government to convict him of a different crime.

skilled 3y ago

It sounds like you have never been to a country where money can buy anything you want, including freedom. Many such countries in the world.

AwaAwa 3y ago
You mean all, it's just the amount that differs.
lb1lf 3y ago
Well, money will only buy you freedom in such places until you annoy someone with deeper pockets than you have sufficiently so that they want you to wind up behind bars. Corruption is an equal opportunity weapon.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]
- skilled 3y ago
  Sure, but that’s in extreme cases. For small stuff like papers, permits and such - talking to the right people will get you anywhere you want to go. I still remember handing over my passport to a guy on a sports bike in Singapore to get an extended stamp for Indonesia, and only a few years later did it occur to me how sketchy the whole situation was.
dale_glass 3y ago
Such countries exist, but as this case and Andrew Tate show, actually putting it in such frank terms may not be a good idea. Yeah, maybe you can buy yourself out of trouble. But I suspect in many such cases the people involved prefer to be bought quietly. Make things too uncomfortably public or too embarrassing and the same people might well throw the book at you.
- skilled 3y ago
  I don’t know the specifics of his case but it is my understanding that EU isn’t as easily bought as South America or Southeast Asia for example. The latter has a system that doesn’t “include” foreigners, whereas someplace like Romania is a lot more Westernized and offering a bribe carries a lot more risk.

bcye 3y ago

Parody, honeypot, maybe both

tedivm 3y ago
Seriously- I feel like I was just added to several government watch lists simply for opening that page.

sgjohnson 3y ago

I know the guy. No, it’s not a parody.

mschuster91 3y ago

Andrew Tate said essentially the same. Turns out corrupt police don't like it when someone brags with that fact. Not that I'd shed any tear for Tate or the other guy though, both deserve all they get and more.

chx 3y ago
Here's what Tate said on The Fellas podcast: > I like living in countries where corruption is accessible for everybody. The emphasis here was on everybody because this followed a rant about how Western societies are corrupt where the rich gets to ignore the laws and he wanted to do the same. He said this in 2022 so whether he really did move in 2017 for this reason is impossible to say.
soco 3y ago
Tate is also arrested currently, so looks like this kind of "honesty" has a price. And in general I'm pretty sure that bribery even when done abroad would get you in trouble in your own country, so I'm quite surprised by such statements put like that in the open.
dudeinjapan 3y ago
[flagged]
- Ms-J 3y ago
  "especially when we offend" This is a fundamental premise of freedom of speech and a large reason as to why it exists. For some reason your comment was flagged, I vouched and voted it up.
  - hotdogscout 3y ago
    Thank you! This happens way too often here, thoughtful arguments being flagged because a few with enough karma believe socialist ideals are mandatory.
  - sudosysgen 3y ago
    I don't find that comment objectionable because it is in favour of freedom of speech, I find it objectionable because it pretends someone with multiple credible allegations of rape and associates who admit to using violence to incite women into sex crimes, who admitted to running illegal casinos and who says he moved to Romania because he doesn't have to follow the law is only in legal trouble because people disagree with his ideas and has done nothing illegal that would warrant charges.