Ramona Nicole Mănescu is a Romanian politician and lawyer. During her legislative terms as an MEP (Member of the European Parliament), Manescu has defended the Azerbaijani regime against the criticism of the European Parliament.

Ramona’s public post on LinkedIn

In 2015, following the adoption of a resolution criticizing the crack-down on the human rights and oppression of the freedom of expression in the country by the European Parliament, Mănescu made a statement supporting Azerbaijan. She referred to the ″democratic values″ of the country.

Mănescu’s pro-Azerbaijani attitude was criticized by human rights organizations, including the Civic Solidarity Platform. The NGO included Mănescu in its investigative report on the European politicians who advocate for Azerbaijan. According to the report with a title “European Values Bought and Sold, An exploration into Azerbaijan’s sophisticated system of projecting its international influence, buying Western politicians and capturing intergovernmental organisations”, in 2016 Mănescu joined the European People’s Party delegation for an observation mission of the controversial constitutional referendum in Azerbaijan. The final report and the composition of the delegation was not published by the European People’s Party.

According to above mentioned report “the composition of the delegation can only be deduced from the media quotes and pictures from the media and official presidential website. In these pictures, for example, besides those specifically mentioned in the media, an MEP Ramona Manescu could be seen during the meeting with Aliyev and the press-conference. A week earlier she was on an EU-Azerbaijan Parliamentary Cooperation Committee visit to Baku, where she could be seen posing next to Aliyev.

One wonders whether between these two events Ms. Manescu enjoyed Azerbaijani hospitality in Baku for several days”.

July 2016. A memorandum of understanding (MoU) has been signed between Azerbaijan’s State Oil Company (SOCAR) and Romania’s state-owned company Transgaz.

In July 2016 the document was signed during a meeting of SOCAR President Rovnag Abdullayev with Ramona Nicole Mănescu, a member of the European Parliament, the chairman of the Transgaz Board of Administration, Ion Sterian, and the head of European Funds Accessing and International Relations Division of Transgaz, Chiprian Alich, in Baku July

The sides emphasized that the signing of the memorandum will strengthen the cooperation between SOCAR and Transgaz on the transportation of natural gas and intensify the joint activities on the natural gas markets of the South East Europe and Baltic region. 

September 2019. Quadrilateral negotiations among Georgia-Romania-Azerbaijan-Turkey and declaration on transport field, adopted by them, have positively been assessed and implementation of the document has been discussed in the meeting, held within the framework of 74th Session of the UN General Assembly in New York.
July 2020. Rareș and Ramona Mănescu together with Ion Sterian, the general manager of Transgaz, enjoying the private dinner at Tahir Karimov’s house (Azerbaijan’s Head of division- PM Office).

Source: Wikipedia, AzVision, PressKlub.az, PSNews, LinkedIn