I am not the captain's lover, says Moldovan dancer

A Moldovan dancer who was being wined and dined by the captain of the Costa Concordia on the night the ship capsized has denied claims she is his lover.

According to the Daily Telegraph, Domnica Cemortan, 25, was seen enjoying dinner with Francesco Schettino, just 30 minutes before the liner careered into rocks off the Italian island of Giglio. She was also seen on the bridge of the ship alongside the captain as the chaotic evacuation got under way. Her apparently close relationship with the 51-year-old has led Italian investigators to question whether the collision may have been a result of him sailing too close to the land in order to show off.But speaking from Moldova, she last night vehemently denied there was anything improper in their relationship.Miss Cemortan, who has a two-year-old daughter, said: "I am not the captain's lover. You know why? He was always showing me photos of his daughter when she was little.

A man who wants a lover does not behave like that."Other rescued passengers claimed they had seen Miss Cemortan and the captain sharing a decanter of wine at around 9pm last Friday. But while admitting having dinner with several of the ship's officers, Miss Cemortan insisted the captain was not with them. "It's false to claim that the captain was with us," she said.Miss Cemortan has been employed by Costa cruises for around five years working as a dancer and also helping translate for Russian passengers on board.

However during the fateful voyage Miss Cemortan was travelling as a passenger in order to celebrate her 25th birthday.Responding to suggestions she did not have her own cabin, Miss Cemortan said that was not true insisting she had her official cabin pass as proof.Describing the moment the vessel struck rocks and began to flounder, Miss Cemortan said she had been asked by the captain personally to join him on the bridge in order to translate information to the 100 or so Russian passengers.

And she claimed that rather than abandoning ship before his passengers as widely suggested, Capt. Schettino had remained on the bridge with his crew."I'm sure that he was still on the bridge (around midnight) because it was at that time that he told us to leave, to abandon ship. I and another colleague said that we wanted to stay. But he told us to run.

I saw him a long time later, on the island."Miss Cemortan, who has joint Romanian and Moldovan nationality, was born in Chisinau, the capital of Moldova. Last night an aunt said she had gone into hiding to get over the trauma of the experience.captain of the Costa Concordia was apparently drinking and dining with a young blonde Moldovan woman just before his vessel ran aground off Giglio Island.

Domnica Cemortan, a cruise ship passenger rep and former dancer, was also reported to have been on the bridge with Captain Francesco Schettino on the night of the disaster.

Several passengers claimed they saw Schettino and a woman resembling Ms Cemortan sharing a decanter of wine shortly before the disaster.Investigators are trying to trace the 25-year-old as they believe she may be able to shed light on what happened when the liner hit a rocky outcrop off Giglio and capsized, leading to the loss of at least 11 lives.

Schettino, 52, who is under house arrest in Meta di Sorrento near Naples, is accused of sailing too close to the island to give a ''salute'' to an old friend and his head waiter's family, and of later abandoning ship when hundreds of his passengers were still trapped on board.The Italian media claimed Ms Cemortan had been invited on to the bridge of the Concordia on the night of the accident. She was said to have been there at the moment of impact as the captain prepared to conduct a spectacular ''sail-past''.Ms Cemortan admitted that she had been on the bridge with Schettino, who has a wife and daughter, but insisted it was not until after the collision, when it is thought she may have been called on to help address passengers in Russian.

''I was on the bridge at 11.50pm and he was there,'' Ms Cemortan told the Moldovan newspaper Adevarul (Truth).She defended Schettino and crew members against criticism of a chaotic evacuation, saying they saved thousands of lives.

''He did a great thing, he saved over 3000 lives,'' she told Moldova's Jurnal TV.Ms Cemortan speaks Russian and had worked as a hostess for the Italian cruise operator, though her contract had expired and she was vacationing with friends when she boarded the liner hours before the disaster.

Passengers suggested the pair were dining together just half an hour before the ship hit the rocks. An Italian couple, Angelo Fabbri and his wife Eleonora Rossi, inadvertently photographed the couple as they took pictures of the dishes served to them in the ship's restaurant.''Schettino, in a dark uniform, was seated in front of the woman,'' Mr Fabbri told an Italian newspaper. ''She seemed young. First of all we thought she might be his daughter.

They were laughing, they seemed very happy. There's no doubt that they drank the whole decanter, the last drops were poured into the captain's wine glass.''They stayed till 9.05pm, I know that for sure because, to record the evening, we photographed the dishes and in one, timed at 9.02pm, the captain and the woman were still at the table,'' Mr Fabbri said. ''He seemed to me a bit of a braggart, in contrast with other cruise captains that we've travelled with.''

The captain reportedly left the restaurant with the woman and the officer at 9.05pm, 37 minutes before the collision. He has insisted to investigators that he did not drink alcohol that night. Schettino faces at least 12 years in jail if convicted of abandoning his ship and multiple counts of manslaughter.