10 March, 2016 UPDATE

Romanian president Klaus Iohannis met Palestinian counterpart Mahmoud Abbas in Ramallah.

Newsroom, 10.03.2016, 12:15

Romania wants its
institutions and businesses to take part in the reconstruction of Palestinian
institutions and the economy, said the Romanian president Klaus Iohannis on
Thursday during talks with his Palestinian counterpart Mahmoud Abbas. Romania’s
contribution to the consolidation of Palestinian institutions forms part of its
support for a two-state solution that would see Israel and Palestine coexist in
peace and security, Klaus Iohannis explained. President Abbas expressed his
satisfaction with the important role played by the graduates of Romanian
universities in Palestinian society, saying they constitute an intellectual and
professional elite with a significant contribution to Palestinian economic,
political and social life. Romania’s president on Sunday began a trip to Israel
and the Palestinian territories. In Jerusalem, he met his Israeli counterpart
Reuven Rivlin, prime minister Benjamin Netanyahu and the speaker of Israel’s
Parliament, as well as representatives of Israeli citizens of Romanian origin.

Romania’s Supreme Defence Council meets on Friday to
discuss a decision by the Constitutional Court according to which the Criminal
Procedure Code provision that allowed the Romanian Intelligence Service to use
surveillance technology in prosecutions is unconstitutional. The intelligence
chief Eduard Hellvig said the ruling would have consequences with regard to
national security, given the correlation between preventing threats to national
security and counteracting related criminal phenomena. He explained the ruling
would make it illegal to use the Service’s sophisticated surveillance equipment
to prosecute espionage and treason, terrorism, cross-border organised crime,
cybercrime and top-level corruption, all of which are major threats to national
security. Hellvig also said a number of ongoing cases would be affected by the
ruling, in particular those involving national security crimes.

The
Social Democratic MP Cristian Rizea is on bail subject to legal restrictions
pending trial. Earlier, the Chamber of Deputies approved a National
Anticorruption Directorate request to detain him, while rejecting the request
for his arrest. Rizea is accused of influence peddling, money laundering and
persuading others to commit perjury. Prosecutors say he received 300,000
euros from an American citizen to use his influence in a case related to the
return of property nationalised by the former communist regime. Rizea rejects
the accusations and says he has been under pressure to withdraw from the race
to become mayor of one of Bucharest’s sectors in the upcoming local elections
on June 5th.

Some 130
military from the Republic of Moldova and the United States are taking part in
the 2016 Agile Hunter joint military exercise. Hosted by the Training Centre of
the Moldova Motorised Infantry Brigade in Balti, the exercise is aimed at
consolidating the ability of the Moldovan army to deal efficiently with hybrid
warfare threats and to cooperate with foreign partners. The drills will end on
March 19 and are part of a training programme that lasts four years. Moldovan
defence minister Anatol Salaru has recently said cooperation with NATO member
states, including Romania, will contribute to expanding the experience of the
Moldovan army, given possible threats of a conflict in the region.

Romania’s highest ranked tennis player Simona Halep, currently fifth in the
world, on Friday faces the American player Vania King, no. 202, in the second
round of the tennis tournament in Indian Wells, the US. Halep, who is the
defending champion in Indian Wells, ended 2015 number 2 in the world but had a
slow start this year, with two wins and four defeats in the WTA circuit. Also
on Friday, another Romanian player, Monica Niculescu, ranked 34th,
meets the British player Heather Watson, no. 53. Two other Romanian players, Irina
Begu and Alexandra
Dulgheru, were eliminated in the first round.

The Son of
Saul, the recipient of this year’s Oscar for best foreign language film opens
in Romanian cinemas on Friday. The Son of Saul is the debut film of director
Laszlo Nemes and features the Romanian actor of Hungarian origin Levente Molnar. The
film tells the story of a Jewish prisoner in Hungary forced to work for the
Nazis at the Auschwitz gas chambers. While working in one of the furnaces, Saul
discovers the body of a boy he suspects to be his own son, and embarks on an
impossible journey, wanting to save the body from cremation and to give the boy
a proper funeral. Levente Molnar, an actor with the Hungarian State Theatre in Cluj
Napoca, plays Saul’s best friend in the film.

(Translated by: C. Mateescu)