Romanian ruling-party MP resigns in corruption row

Viorel Hrebenciuc, the 61-year-old vice-president of parliament's lower house, is suspected along with another lawmaker, Dan Sova, of collaborating to produce a bill on pardons in criminal cases that could have benefited him.

The European Union has raised concerns about a failure to tackle rampant high-level corruption in Romania and Bulgaria, its two poorest members. But with a weary public no longer shocked by such cases, the affair is not expected to damage Social Democrat Prime Minister Victor Ponta in a Nov. 2 presidential election which polls suggest he will win.

Lower house speaker Valeriu Zgonea told reporters after speaking with Hrebenciuc: "He said he was a correct man all his life and that he wouldn't want to walk the street and harm the party.

"He submits his resignation as a parliamentary deputy and he will put himself at the disposal of the justice system ... It's a normal move in a European country."

Hrebenciuc was not immediately available to comment. Calls to his mobile phone went unanswered, and he did not respond to a message left on his voicemail.

The anti-graft investigators of the Directia Nationala Anticoruptie (DNA) say Hrebenciuc used his influence to prompt Sova, a Social Democrat senator, to propose a bill last week on amnesty and pardons. If passed into law, it could have protected him from prison in another case involving a transfer of forest land in 2012.

Prosecutors say the pair had "discussed in detail" the risk of Hrebenciuc being convicted in that case, in which he and Ilie Sarbu, the prime minister's father-in-law, are suspected of supporting an organised crime group. Sova and Sarbu have declined to comment.

(Editing by Mark Trevelyan)