An important driving force behind the Romanian rule of law referrals was an individual judge: Dragoș Călin, co-president of AFJR. Having obtained a doctoral degree in law on the topic of The Dialogue Between Constitutional Courts and the Court of Justice of the European Union, Judge Dragoș Călin was one the first three interns at the ECJ before Romania’s accession, where he translated the historical cases of the Court and made them available for the National Institute of the Magistracy, thus creating a learning basis of European law for young trainees. Later, he became a trainer of the same Institute in the field of European Union law. In an interview in 2021, Judge Călin explained that the activity of the Romanian Judges’ Forum Association, established in 2007, was centered around a group of Romanian magistrates amounting, in some periods, to 3,000 judges and prosecutors. The publication of the association, the Judges’ Forum Journal, collected the points of view of judges and academics from outside Romania regarding the rule of law developments in respect of judicial independence.

 Sorina Doroga and Raluca Bercea, The Role of Judicial Associations in Preventing Rule
of Law Decay in Romania: Informal Communication and Strategic Use of Preliminary References
,
in German Law Journal (2023), 24, pp. 1393–1411

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