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Today's paper. Last Updated: 05/29/2012

Romania's Royal Fray

BUCHAREST () -- Exiled King Michael of Romania appeared locked on a collision course with the country's post-communist government after it threatened to throw him out if he made a planned visit home Friday.


Presidential spokesman Traian Chebeleu said Thursday that Michael, 72, could expect a repetition of a failed 1990 attempt to return to the land of his birth. On that occasion, he was escorted out of the country within hours.


President Ion Iliescu has said he considers Swiss-based Michael a "foreign citizen" who would need a visa and would have to give a very good reason to get one. But analysts say the president fears popular perceptions of the lack of legitimacy of the regime compared to the legitimacy of the exiled king, who enjoys widespread public support.


Michael and his loyalist supporters insist he wants no confrontation with the left-wing government and does not question the 1991 republican constitution but is determined to assert his right to visit his homeland.




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