March 8, 2024 UPDATE
A roundup of local and international news.
Newsroom, 08.03.2024, 19:56
ELECTIONS – The Romanian Government on Friday issued the Emergency Order setting June 9 as official election date for both European elections and local elections. The election campaign starts on March 12. The Government says holding these two types of elections on the same date, has numerous advantages and it might motivate citizens to go to the polls. The head of the Permanent Election Authority, Toni Grebla, says that the whole process regarding holding two types of elections simultaneously was held with the observance of the Constitution, of the Venice Commission regulations and of the laws in the field. Electronic technologies monitoring voter turnout and preventing illegal voting will be used, a system administered, as in the previous elections, by the Special Telecommunication Service.
NATO – The Romanian Foreign Ministry welcomes Sweden’s accession to NATO, by submitting, on March 7, the instrument of ratification to the US State Department, the depository of the Washington Treaty. By joining NATO, Sweden is stronger and safer, and the Alliance more consolidated, the Romanian Foreign Ministry said. The press release reaffirms the fact that Romania remains ‘a firm promoter of the Open Doors policy’.
ECONOMY – The National Institute for Statistics has revised its economic growth rate forecast for last year up to 2.1%, and that for the fourth quarter of last year down to minus 0.5%, according to provisional data published on Friday. The International Monetary Fund estimated a 2.3% economic growth rate for Romania in 2023, while the World Bank forecast 1.8% in its latest report, 0.8% less than in its previous estimate.
UKRAINE -The Romanian foreign ministry in Bucharest said it will not recognize the legitimacy of the presidential elections held by Russia in Donetsk, Luhansk, Zaporizhzhia, Kherson, the Autonomous Republic of Crimea and the city of Sevastopol. The ministry said in a statement that these are integral parts of Ukraine and reconfirmed the firm support for Ukraine’s independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity within its internationally recognized borders. The Romanian foreign ministry strongly discourages Romanian citizens or legal entities from taking part in the monitoring of the elections in the Russian Federation. It also recalls that the presence of Romanian citizens on Russian-occupied Ukrainian territory, including for purposes of observing and monitoring these elections, is liable to criminal and administrative consequences in keeping with the Ukrainian law.
US – The war in Ukraine and the need to support this country in the face of Russian aggression was one of the themes tackled by the US president Joe Biden in his state of the union address. According to Radio Romania’s correspondent in Washington, the speech was a summary of the policies pursued by the Biden administration and an opportunity to make promises about the future, including raising the salaries of public-school teachers. Biden, who will run for a second term in office, also criticized his rival Donald Trump for what he described as his “bowing down” to the Russian leader Vladimir Putin and his position on guns, at a time when the United States is facing a genuine epidemic of armed attacks. (EE)
