Well, it’s not about that. Before being suspended, Romanian President Traian Basescu awarded, post-mortem, the “Star of Romania” to the deceased Liviu Librescu, the Romanian-born professor that died at Virginia Tech while holding the door closed so his students could escape their attacker.

For that, Basescu will show up in next year’s Guinness Book of World: Fastest Presidential answer to a citizen request

So no, not nationalistic pride. But as the linked article mentions, it would be nice if more presidents actually ‘listened to the streets’ once in a while.