‘Most-Favored’ Romania Status

“Right Is Wrong on Romania” (Editorial Pages, July 25) seems to miss the point on Romania’s “most-favored-nation” status: Its foreign debt. Without that status Romania would be unable to pay interest on its dollar loans, a thing nobody here wants to happen. So Ceausescu’s “despotic, Stalinist-style government that represses its own people” is forgiven.

If not to forgive is associated with “Neanderthal views”, what are the views held by the writer? The “small degree of leverage” the United States has on their policies is non-existent, according to David Funderburk, and cannot justify forgiveness. And to sanctify Romania by mentioning it on the same level with Hungary, Yugoslavia and China does not excuse forgiveness either. These countries are now in the process of shedding the shackles of outdated Marxism, while Romania uses communism to stifle the Western-oriented non-Romanian cultures within its 60-year-old boundaries.

AKOS THIERY

Camarillo