August 31, 2019

Click here for a roundup of domestic and international news

Newsroom, 31.08.2019, 13:50

IMF The International Monetary Fund
recommends the Romanian authorities to kick off a process of sustainable fiscal
consolidation to reassess the new pension law, which is to come into effect on
Sunday and to improve management in state-owned companies. According to an IMF
report, the Romanian economic growth would stay around 4% in 2019 and slow down
to 3% on medium term. According to the IMF, against the backdrop of raising
vulnerabilities the Romanian authorities need to capitalize on the present
economic progress to kick off a sustainable process of fiscal consolidation. According
to estimates, Romania’s budget deficit will account for 3.7% of the GDP in 2019
unless additional measures are taken. Furthermore the IMF experts believe the
fresh pension law passed in June 2019 needs to be reassessed as it may
jeopardize the fiscal sustainability.

FESTIVAL Between August 31st and
September 22nd Bucharest will be playing venue for the 24th edition of the
George Enescu International Festival, the biggest edition of this event so far.
This edition’s central theme is ‘The world in Harmony’ and the festival’s
artistic director is Vladimir Jurowski. Bucharest and 10 other cities in
Romania and abroad in countries like Germany, France, Italy, Canada and the
Republic of Moldova are also to be hosting events associated with this
prestigious international festival of classical music in honor of Romania’s
greatest composer. The festival is expected to bring together 25 hundred of the
world’s best musicians who will be performing in 84 concerts and recitals. 24
concerts will be hosted by Romania’s major cities, Cluj-Napoca, Timisoara,
Iasi, Sibiu, Targu Mures, Bacau, Barlad, Targoviste, Satu Mare and Piatra
Neamt. The 2019 edition of this festival is expected to include 34 premieres
and 25 first performances by artists like Marion Cotillard, Kiril Petrenko,
Mitsuko Uchida as well as nine of the world’s best orchestras. Concerts and
recitals have been grouped in six big sections: ‘Greatest World Orchestras’,
‘Midnight Concertos’, ‘Chamber Music Recitals and Concertos’, ’21st Century
Music’, ‘Mozart Week in Residence’ and ‘The Composers International Forum’. The
festival will also include conferences, book and album launches as well as
other events.

LANGUAGE Cultural events staged
concurrently in Romania, the Republic of Moldova and the Romanian communities
abroad are today marking the Romanian Language Day. The event, which was
endorsed by the Romanian Parliament in 2013, is held concurrently with the
national celebration in the neighboring Republic of Moldova to honour the
national awakening movement in the ex-soviet Romanian-speaking country. We
recall that on August 31st 1989 during the Soviet Union, under the
pressure of 750 thousand protesters, Parliament in Chisinau declared Romanian
as the country’s official language choosing the Latin alphabet instead of the
Cyrillic one imposed by the Soviet invaders after the country’s annexation in
1940.

VISIT Maia Sandu, the pro-Western
Prime Minister of the neighboring Republic of Moldova (an ex-soviet
Romanian-speaking country), is paying a four-day visit to the United States for
talks on ways of deepening the strategic bilateral dialogue. According to Radio
Romania correspondents in Chisinau, Sandu mentioned the visit’s most important
moment is the meeting with Secretary of State Mike Pompeo but didn’t refer to the
talks agenda. The Moldovan official is expected to also have talks with
officials from the Department of Defense, the Central Intelligence Agency and
the Millennium Challenge Corporation. Sandu’s visit to Washington had been
preceded by the visit the National Security Advisor John Bolton paid to
Chisinau. Bolton said the USA supports the sovereignty and independence of the
Republic of Moldova, which has to decide its future without influences from
abroad. Bolton also said that Washington supports the government’s efforts for
settling the conflict in the breakaway pro-Russia region of Transdniester,
which had broken out of Chisinau’s control in 1992.

(translated by bill)