December 16, 2013
A roundup of domestic and international news
Ştefan Stoica, 16.12.2013, 00:00
Meeting in Brussels in preparation for the Winter Summit running Thursday and Friday, EU Foreign Ministers are set to discuss an agenda that includes the Eastern Partnership and the situation in the Ukraine. They will be analyzing the future course of the Partnership after the summit in Vilnius, with emphasis on the situation in Ukraine. Other major topics are Syria, Lebanon, the Middle East and the partnership between the EU and Russia. The Iranian nuclear situation will be another major topic of interest, in the context of the recent common action plan established in Geneva in November. Romania is represented by its head diplomat, Titus Corlatean.
Romanian Minister of Agriculture Daniel Constantin starts on Monday a three-day visit to the Republic of Moldova, to attend informal consultations in preparation for the European regional conference of the Food and Agriculture Organization, taking part in Bucharest next year. He is talking there with the deputy regional representative of the organization, Tony Alonzi, and with the future regional representative for Europe and Central Asia, Vladimir Rakhmanin. The Romanian minister will also be meeting his counterpart in Chisinau, Vasile Bumacov, at the official launch of a major wine exhibition.
Timisoara, the city where the Romanian 1989 Revolution started, started celebrating the 24th anniversary of that event. The anti-communist revolt began on December 16th, when youth started protesting against abuses perpetrated by the authorities. The revolution spread quickly across the country, and culminated with dictator Ceausescu’s flight from Bucharest.
Romania’s national women’s handball team failed to qualify to the quarterfinals of the world championships in Serbia, after being narrowly defeated by Poland on Sunday, 31 to 29. Poland will be going to France to play in the quarterfinals. We recall that Romania holds three world titles, gold in 1962, and silver in 1973 and 2005. It is also the only country to attend the final stages of every world championship since 2005.
