March 4, 2016 UPDATE

A roundup of domestic and international news

Newsroom, 04.03.2016, 12:32

The former Romanian sovereign King Mihai I is in a
hospital in Lausanne, Switzerland, where he was taken a few days ago, according
to his press office. He is physically weak, but stable, and receives constant
treatment. In a statement published on Wednesday, the 94-year-old king said he
received news of a serious medical diagnosis a few weeks ago, at a time when
his family and Romania celebrate 150 years since the establishment of the
dynasty and the formation of the Romanian modern state. Diagnosed with two types of cancer, Mihai I
has also undergone surgery. He handed over his public responsibilities to his
older daughter, princess Margareta. Born on the 25th of October
1921, Mihai I was king between 1927 and 1930 and then again from 1940 until
1947, when he was forced by the communists to abdicate and go into
exile. He returned to Romania after the collapse of the communist regime in
1989.

The Romanian prime minister Dacian Ciolos on Monday
travels to Brussels to attend the EU – Turkey summit. The flatter plays a crucial role in stemming the flow of migrants to
Europe. Ciolos will also attend an informal meeting of European Council
members. On Tuesday, he will have talks with the European Council president
Donald Tusk about internal EU issues, including the economic situation,
employment, the refugee crisis, Schengen, the EU’s relationship with Britain
and the energy union. The two officials will also tackle external issues, such
as the eastern neighbourhood, the Republic of Moldova and Syria. In another
meeting scheduled for Tuesday, Dacian Ciolos will meet NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg to discuss
regional security issues, such as NATO’s presence in eastern Europe, the Black
Sea area and the EU-NATO strategic relationship. On Wednesday, Romania’s prime
minister travels to The Hague for talks with his Dutch counterpart Mark Rutte
and other senior officials.

After
20 years, the Republic of Moldova comes back to directly electing the head of
state, according to a ruling issued by the Constitutional Court on Friday. The
court decided that the amendments brought to the Moldovan Constitution in 2000,
under which the head of state was elected by Parliament, are now null and void.
The court argued that the election of the president by parliament had triggered
many political crises. The election procedure is to be established under an
organic law, and the Court has ruled that Parliament must immediately adopt the
law. The term of the current president, Nicolae Timofti, ends on March 22nd.

The
project titled ‘Less Developed Regions’, targeting Romania’s poor areas was one
of the topics discussed in Bucharest on Friday by President Klaus Iohannis and
the European Commissioner for Regional Policy, Corina Cretu. Under this
program, which has been recently launched in Romania as well, the European
Commission will support the regions whose GDP is below 50% of the EU average,
in order to identify and overcome the barriers in the way of using community
funds. According to a communiqué, the two officials also discussed the revision
of the evaluation mechanisms and relaunching the absorption of European funds,
as well as the importance of funding projects in fields such as education and
health-care.

The former
Romanian deputy prime minister and interior minister Gabriel Oprea has resigned
from his position as leader of the National Union for the Progress of Romania
party. He justified his decision saying he does not want the scandal in which
he is involved to affect his party in an election year. Oprea is under
investigation for abuse of office while serving as interior minister.
Anti-corruption prosecutors accuse him of authorising the purchase of a luxury
car by the ministry and of abusively using official police escort to which he
was not entitled.

According to the Sanitary and Veterinary Agency, the E.coli bacteria has not been found in milk produced by
farms in the Romanian counties of Arges and Dolj. The
tests have been carried out as part of a wide-scale investigation to find the
source of the E.coli bacteria that infected tens of children in Arges.
Agriculture minister Achim Irimescu does not rule out that the source may be
the fresh cow cheese produced by a factory using milk from the farms in Arges and
Dolj. The representatives of the Federation of Producers of Traditional
Products do not agree with the minister and say his statement caused a lot of
damage to the image and sales of these producers, whose sales allegedly dropped
by 40%. Three infants have died since the beginning of February because of
serious digestive complications caused by the E.coli bacteria.

Romania’s
Davis Cup team this weekend faces Slovenia in Arad, western Romania, in the
first round of the Europe – Africa Group I. In the first singles game, Marius
Copil, no.202 in the ATP world ranking, defeated in three sets Blaz Rola,
ranked 160th. In a doubles match on Saturday, Horia Tecau and Florin
Mergea will face Tomislav Ternar and Aliaz Radinski. Sunday will see the last
two singles matches, with Adrian Ungur facing Blaz Rola and Marius Copil taking
on Grega Zemlja.