July 26, 2014 UPDATE
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România Internațional, 26.07.2014, 19:23
The National Liberal Party and the Liberal Democratic Party, making up the right-of-centre opposition in Romania, merged on Saturday. The merger protocol was unanimously approved in a joint congress of the two parties. Their immediate goal is to win the presidential election this November with a common candidate, which is why they will establish a Christian-Liberal electoral alliance. Their candidate is viewed as the most likely challenger, in the second round of the presidential election in November, for the Social Democratic PM Victor Ponta, who officially announced his candidacy on Thursday. On Saturday, the Civic Force, a small party headed by the ex-PM Mihai Razvan Ungureanu, merged into the Liberal Democratic Party.
The Romanian-Hungarian relations require mutual respect, the Conservative PM of Hungary Viktor Orban said on Saturday, while attending the Summer University of the Hungarian youth in Romania, held in the resort of Tusnad in central Romania. The Hungarian official voiced his displeasure with what he called a series of statements coming from Romanian officials, which were disrespectful of the Hungarians. Cristian Diaconescu, a former foreign minister of Romania, who also attended the meeting, said that mutual respect was always at the basis of Bucharest’s attitude as to Hungary. The 1.5-million strong Hungarian ethnic minority, living mostly in the centre and west of Romania, accounts for six per cent of the country’s total population. Its main political party, the Democratic Union of Ethnic Hungarians in Romania, is a member of the ruling coalition in Bucharest.
The foreign ministers of several European countries, as well as Turkey, Qatar, and USA, for an extension of the 12-hour ceasefire that came into force on Saturday morning in Gaza, between the Israeli army and the Islamist movement Hamas. According to the French foreign minister, Laurent Fabius, pleaded for a long-term truce that would address Israel’s legitimate security needs and the Palestinians’ need for social-economic development. In nearly 3 weeks of conflict, more than a thousand Palestinians and around 40 Israelis have been killed. On Friday night, the Romanian Government headquarters was picketed by Palestinians and supporters of their cause, calling for an end to the offensive in Gaza. Since the start of the conflict, Romania has repatriated over 100 nationals from the area, at their request.
