Washington: The administration of US President Donald Trump demands that Romania lift travel restrictions on British-American social media personality and former UK kickboxer Andrew Tate and his brother Tristan, charged with human trafficking and rape in Romania, the Financial Times newspaper reported, citing sources.
On February 14, a Bucharest court decided to replace house arrest with judicial control in the case of Andrew Tate.
A request has been filed to return the brothers’ passports and allow them to travel while they await the outcome of the trial, the report said on Monday.
The Tate brothers’ case was first mentioned in a phone call between US officials and the Romanian government last week, the report read, adding that US President Donald Trump’s special envoy, Richard Grenell, later discussed the issue with Romanian Foreign Minister Emil Hurezeanu on the sidelines of the Munich Security Conference.
On December 29, 2022, the Romanian police detained the Tate brothers and charged them with human trafficking, rape and violence. On December 30, the Bucharest Court placed them under arrest for 30 days. The Romanian authorities seized the brothers’ property worth about 3.6 million euros ($3.7 million). The term of their arrest was extended several times then, and in late March 2023, they were put under house arrest upon the lawyers’ request.
