SRS: In the beginning I would like to congratulate you for getting back your general rank. IMP: And I would like to start by congratulating you for the new Romanian government. This is the first time in 60 years that the Government of Romania is now longer shaped on a main line made of communists and agents of the Communist Secret Service. SRS: Traian Basescu announced he would run as candidate for the president of Romania just three months before elections. What is your view on his victory? IMP: Romania has started to build a middle class representing national conscious. The latter has concluded it is better for the country to be ruled by some Traian than by the followers of Ilici. In fact, it is the followers of Traian that founded Great Romania. Ilici's followers just made it smaller. SRS: Do you think the Romanian president will manage to make Romania leave the communist past behind at last? IMP: I hope so. Madeleine Albright, US ex minister of foreign affairs, used to say that only tough politicians could change the course of history. The Bucharest - London - Washington line and the fact that Romania is now ruled by people of the same age as my daughter, who is more interested in the future than in the past, tell my that President Basescu has successfully passed the "Albright test". SRS: What do you think he should start with? IMP: With getting rid of the flaws repeatedly presented by USA administration: corruption dominating today's Romania and the Communist Secret Service mob net in control of corruption. Mr. Michael Guest, our former ambassador to Bucharest, Mr. Jack Dyer Crouch II, our present ambassador as well as Mr. Thomas Delare, second head of mission, have given thorough explanations on these flaws. I want to add here the political duality of country rulers. SRS: What political duality are you referring to? IMP: At the one towards USA. The leaders of Communist Romania have always used dual policy on their main "enemy". While Ceausescu was praising president Carter for instance, he was coordinating operations meant to compromise and recruit his brother. Iliescu's successor continued this duality. While proclaiming loyalty to USA and NATO, he made General Mihai Caraman head of Romanian intelligence. Caraman was the only officer in the Communist Secret Services awarded by Moscow for "special merits in anti - NATO activity". On April 5 1991 he signed pact with Moscow that Romania would participate in no military alliance with unfriendly attitude towards USSR. Washington can remember that while stating in the open that the Romanian secret service became the ally of USA, Victor Mitran (one of my former employees, dismissed from DIE - Intelligence Department - after I got political exile in USA and hired by SRI -the Romanian Secret Service - after Ceausescu's death) was producing evidence showing SRI was actually hand in hand with KGB. At Moscow's request, in 1991 SRI ordered Mitran to organize gross challenge against the USA consul to Bucharest Mark Sullivan, meant to recruit or compromise him. The challenge was coordinated by KGB officer Fiodor Bodnari, under cover agent at the Russian embassy in Bucharest and also by SRI head Virgil Magureanu. As consequence, Sullivan was withdrawn from Romania. Six years later evidence came up that SRI continued to obey Moscow. On November 16 1996, USA authorities arrested CIA officer Harold J. Nicholson and accused him of intelligence for Russia. The "new" KGB closely watched him in 1991-1992, when he was head of the CIA group in Romania. It was another common action, also coordinated by Fiodor Bodnari and Virgil Magureanu. In 1997, Magureanu was stating in the open that SRI became the reliable ally of USA. But Mihai Pelin, his official historian, released the study "What Is Behind Romanian Intelligence", a so - called book calling for anti - American attitude. Starting form the idea that the communist dictatorship had been a legitimate regime, the men in charge took disgusting efforts to persuade people that the Romanians asking for political exile in USA during the Cold War had "betrayed" Romania's national interests. SRS: In January 1993, when I first interviewed you in Romania after the fall of Ceausescu, you define the Communist Secret mob as cancer tumor on the country's body. Who are we to thank for this tumor? IMP: The SRI of that time. In 1994, SRI released "The White Book of the Communist Secret Service". It made Romania turn into the only country in the ex Soviet group whose government gave "carte blache" to the dreadful communist political police. This misinformation work made up of 5 volumes was released in Romania and abroad for free. It tried to make people believe that the Communist Secret Service served Romania's national interests during that historical stage and hence that its ex officers had to be used in the new secret services. The White Book of the Communist Secret Service also struggled to confirm the Communist version of Romania's history. It included 42 pages of "documents" on July 1947, the day when Ion Mihalache and more leaders of PNT (the National Christian - Democrat Party) were arrested. This example is enough. It shows the scenario by the Communist Secret Service, saying PNT as foreign intelligence link acting against Romania's interests, a link they had to destroy. Iuliu Maniu, Dinu Bratianu, Gheorghe Tatarascu, Titel Petrescu, Nicolae Penescu and Corneliu Coposu were also presented as "traitors". But the book we are taking about said nothing on the role political parties had played in creating Great Romania. It didn't even refer to the physical and moral terror the Communist Secret Service had used to set up political trials killing almost the entire Romanian political, social, cultural, scientific, and artistic elite of the time. This "historical research" went that far with promoting the view of the Communist Secret Service on Romania that it ignored or just mentioned uprising moves of international significance such as the dissidence of Paul Goma, the "Charta 77" or the so - called "journalists' plot" in 1988 - 1989. I dare suggest the new Romania government to initiate the elaboration of the real history of the Communist Secret Service. Otherwise, those who know about these atrocities will disappear in some 30-40 years. They are the only living source for the activity of this murderous institution and for it documents it faked. SRS: Before asking for political exile, you knew ex president Iliescu well. At what terms have you been after the fall of communism? IMP: As I have written in the American press, Mr. Iliescu was not my favorite and I was not his favorite. During Ceausescu's regime we went a long way together: he was communist leader and I was leader of the Communist Secret Service. I July 1978 I got separated from communism and we took different ways. Mr. Iliescu continued to be member of the part's executive committee that reached to death sentences against me and which have not been officially eradicated yet. I helped the West see that party as it really was: the instrument of a Soviet - like dictatorship. Behind the Marxist semblance, it ruled the country with the help of the Communist Secret Service. In 1996 I published in your daily and in the "Free World" in New York at the same time a 30- article series on the survival of the Communist Secret Service. I pleaded for helping Romania get rid of KGB. In January 1997, SRI spokesman Nicolae Ulieru stated to Reuters Agency: "These are lies. Pacepa is a traitor." This was political premier: it was the first time a representative of the Romanian "democratic' government openly called "traitor" a former Romanian citizen who had asked USA for political exile and contributed to the fight against terrorism. Not even Ceausescu used made such description! It erected some Chinese wall between the administration of ex president Iliescu and myself. SRS: Iliescu refused 5 whole years to carry out the Supreme Court sentence, that decided you were to be given bank rank and annulled the other sentences the Communists had reached. Under pressure from the West, in March 2004 the ex president ordered MAI (the Ministry of Internal Affairs) to give you back the military rank. Why didn't they do it then? IMP: This ministry is still filled with former Communist Secret agents. It refused to carry out presidential order. At the beginning MAI invoke printing error: in my birth certificate my mane was spelled with dotted "e". In August 2004, the Prosecutor's Office decided that "Pacipa" and "Pacepa" were one and the same person. When they got rid of this pretext, MAI claimed Pacepa had died and the High Court sentence was left with no object. USA administration reacted promptly: the USA embassy to Bucharest informed Romanian officials I was alive, that I was US citizen living in USA. Despite it, in October 2004 MAI announced final verdict: it was not going to carry out High Court sentence and president Iliescu's order. During communism, the principle of the Communist Secret Service used to be "We are the law". The head of the state was the only one they respected. Now it seems they don't even respect him any longer. SRS: What positive and negative elements has the ex president brought Romania? IMP: I lack objectivity and enough historical distance to issue such opinion. Therefore I can only talk about "Romania's Rise", an article I published in America in July 2004. I informed Western public opinion that the historical decision reached on June 8 2004 by the Security Council - approval for transfer of sovereignty to the Iraqi government - had been initiated by USA and England, as the Western press mentioned, but by Romania as well. During his third mandate, ex president Iliescu managed to bring Romania and USA close in order to prepare the country for joining NATO. History will decide if he did it out of belief or out of desire to take profit. SRS: How are you feeling now, that you have been rehabilitated at last? IMP: I was rehabilitated in July 1978, when the President signed document in favor of my political exile. The Western world I live in believes those who served communism till the last minute must be rehabilitated, but not those who betrayed it. Romania is the only NATO state where most of those who supported USA fight against the Soviet empire are still labeled as "traitors". The list is long and embarrassing. Mr. Ion Stana, my former employee in DIE, gives revealing examples on such political hypocrisy. In 1985, Ceausescu sentenced him to 20 years of prison for having supported US fight against communism. Mr. Stana was tortured 5 years in the prison houses in Calea Rahovei, Jilava, Craiova and Aiud. In the hot days of December 1989, he was released from prison. In 1992, the Prosecutor's Office ordered he come behind bars again, till 2004, when his sentence was up. But USA gave him political exile at once. In 2003, Romanian authorities proclaimed him to be anti - communist fighter. In February 2004, Mr. Stana asked the sentence reached by Ceausescu's Justice be annulled. In April 19 2004, they rejected his petition. The Military Court wrote him that the sentence reached by the Communist court was "grounded" and "legal", that his guilt had been judged "correctly and completely". In other words, the present Romanian Justice goes on with the communist concept saying USA was the country's "main enemy". US Ambassador Richard Davies succeeded to persuade the Polish government that the collaboration of Colonel Riszard Kuklinsky with CIA against communist served the interests of the Polish people. Davies tried to do the same with the Romanian government. In June 26 1997, for instance, Ambassador Davies used VOA to appeal to the Romanian government and make it admit "the contribution to the undermining of communism" of those who had fought in the West "against Ceausescu's dictatorship, one of the most dreadful dictatorships in recent history. For Romania it is highly important that the people should at last look at the mirror of real history." I hope the new president of Romania will explain to Romanian citizens and to Justice officials that USA and CIA have never been the enemies of the Romanian people. They were just the enemies of Romanian communism. I also hope President Basescu will make clear one more key problem: what does treason mean and who is to be considered a traitor. This will enrage the Communist Secret Service mob that continues to have powerful positions in Romania. But I hope it will no longer have decisive position in Romanian politics. "I have never asked a thing from the Romanian government" SRS: The previous government and much of the press claimed you asked for rehabilitation and for the restitution of your properties confiscated by the Communist Secret Service. Is it true? IMP: I have never asked a thing from the Romanian government. The Supreme Court admitted the canceling appeal initiated by Romanian General Attorney Mircea Criste to deny sentences against me reached by communist Justice. He annulled those sentences. I refused to be represented by some lawyer and the Supreme Court chose one (Lucian Belcea, head of the bar). I think I didn't need to defend myself for having fought against communism and getting two death sentences in exchange. The former administration wanted to distract attention from the fact that during 5 years this Supreme Court decision had not been applied. It came up with rumor that I had asked them to give my back my properties confiscated by the communists and that "after betraying my country, I wanted to rob it." This is a lie. All I want is my name no longer be used to artificially fuel the anti - American atmosphere in Romania. SRS: For 28 years now American has considered you hero fighting communism. For 28 years many Romanians have considered you a "traitor"? Why is this? IMP: Because in 24 out of these 28 years Romania was ruled by ex communists and men from the Communist Secret Service who served Ceusescu till his last minute. Afterwards they produced artificial anti - American atmosphere in Romania, for fear they should lose positions. General Wojchieh Jaruzelski, former president of Communist Poland till the abolishment, explained this in a suggestive manner: "If Kuklinki is to be declared a hero, what shall we be?" In 2004, General Ioan Talpes who had served Ceausescu till the dictator died repeated the same: "If Pacepa is to be a general again, I shall no longer be." SRS: The fact that you had asked for political exile provided you with prestige in the eyes of the Communist Secret Service members during Ceausescu's reign. Some dozens of them followed your example at once. Why do the Communist Secret Service members who stayed in Romania hate you so fiercely? IMP: After Ceausescu's death I took up crusade to eliminate the members of the Communist Secret Service from state structures. First I came with appeal on "The Voice of America" (recently published by "Jurnalul National") and on the "Wall Street Journal" to turn Communist Secret Service centers into museums of freedom. In 1993, my book "The Inheritance of Kremlin" was released. I elaborated on the Romanian government's efforts to preserve the Soviet system at rule in Romania with help from the political police and the Communist Secret Service. There were some 60,000 copies of my book and they got out of sale at once. I presently learnt SRI had bought most of the copies. In 1999 I published the "Black Book of the Communist Secret Service" trilogy. It elaborated on the fact that the Communist Secret Service was rooted in the traditions and counties of Russia, not in Romania, that it had been created and led by Soviet officers, that it had built huge phone -bugging networks, as well as censorship on mail, agents and collaborators that were unidentified. This made my former colleagues call me "traitor". SRS: Some of the first measures President Basescu has announced is CNSAS (the National Council for Research on the Former Communist Secret Service Archive) taking over the archive of the Communist Secret Service and over the depositing building. What is your opinion on this decision? IMP. I believe this is excellent. It is time for the wolf to stop protecting the sheep. In USA I had much talk with Mr. Ticu Dumitrescu on his law project, meant to open this archive. As state secretary in the Internal Affairs Ministry, I dealt with note computing and micro notes. As American citizen, I spent a lot of time doing research on the STASI archive. Had the project been adopted, the Secret Communist Service would not have continued to rule Romania and the Parliament would de empty of some Ristea Priboi guys nesting inside. Now the latter will certainly oppose the efforts taken by the new president of Romania to get stated structures ready of communists and do replace the reign of man with the reign of law. I hope this delicate archive will soon be taken from the hands of the Communist Secret Service members. I hope that the future elections, whether early or not, will have as candidates those who did not serve the Communist Secret Service. I also hope I shall live to see law on lustration in Romania.