Mădălina-Sorina Vlangăr was elected on 21 October director-general of the Southeast European Law Enforcement Center (SELEC), in the first round, at the 27th Council meeting in Bucharest. Romania, Serbia and Albania put up candidates. Cătălin Predoiu announced the result on Facebook, on his last day as interior minister. This is a SELEC Council election, not a unilateral Interior Ministry appointment.

The ministry’s statement says Romania’s candidate obtained the votes required from the member states. Predoiu spoke of almost a year of work on the candidacy and a vote of confidence in the vision Romania put forward. That is the wording after the ballot, not a decision he took alone.

SELEC is based in Bucharest. Predoiu and AGERPRES describe it as the only organisation in south-east Europe with regional operational work against cross-border crime. The 11 members, in AGERPRES’s list: Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Greece, North Macedonia, Moldova, Montenegro, Serbia, Romania, Hungary and Türkiye.

Vlangăr is a chief commissioner and previously headed Constanța County Police. Predoiu’s thanks to Interior colleagues who prepared the file belong to the campaign, not to the vote in the room.

On the same day Predoiu handed the ministry to Marian Neacșu. The SELEC announcement sits on his last day in office; it is not a power of the new minister and not a handover of the SELEC file. The two ceremonies do not mix.

Until a Council notice with the round-by-round score, the closed fact is the election: Vlangăr director-general of SELEC in the first round, in Bucharest, against Serbia and Albania.

Image: Britchi Mirela, Romanian Interior Ministry, Bucharest, 29 July 2017, CC BY-SA 4.0, Wikimedia Commons; the 2017 facade, not a photograph of the 21 October 2026 SELEC vote.

Sources consulted: Catalin Predoiu says Romania has won the SELEC director-general post - Antena 3; Predoiu: Romania secures SELEC director-general position - AGERPRES.