November 9, 2022 UPDATE

A roundup of local and international news.

Newsroom, 09.11.2022, 19:47

NATO. The
meeting of NATO foreign ministers in Bucharest on November 29th and 30th
confirms Romania’s role in the current security context and reflects the
Allies’ interest in the region. The statement was made by Romania’s permanent
representative to NATO, Dan Neculăescu. He recalled that Romania hosted a NATO summit
in 2008, a meeting of NATO defence ministers and a meeting of the NATO Military
Committee, the organisation’s highest military authority. The meeting of
foreign ministers in late November will be the first of this kind ever hosted
by Romania. It will include 4 sessions focusing on the implementation of the decisions
of the Madrid Summit, the war in Ukraine, energy security and partners. Invited
to attend the meeting are also Ukraine, the Republic of Moldova, Georgia,
Finland, Sweden and Bosnia.

Tanks. The
French Army is sending 13 Leclerc tanks to the Cincu military base in Romania.
The equipment is scheduled to reach the military base in central Romania by
rail in about a week. The Leclerc is one of the most expensive tanks in the
world, able to hit targets at a distance of 4 km while moving at 50 km per
hour. France will send to Cincu a total of nearly 150 combat vehicles with
complete equipment and ammunition, in order to reinforce NATO’s eastern flank
in the context of the war in Ukraine. The NATO battle group in Romania,
stationed in Cincu, was created and led, since May, by France.

Migrants. Some 500 people of different nationalities were rescued by the
Romanian border police during an operation to prevent and combat migration in
which they took part in the Mediterranean for four months, between 8th
July and 6th November. The Romanian police were part of Operation
Themis organised by FRONTEX, the European Border and Coast Guard Agency, on the
European Union’s external maritime borders. They carried out individual patrol,
surveillance and search and rescue missions on the EU maritime border in
southern Italy.

Border. The Romanian government approved the opening of the Vicovu de Sus-Krasnoilsk border crossing and
customs check point betweeen Romania and Ukraine.
Prime minister Nicolae Ciucă and his Ukrainian counterpart Denys Shmyhal will
attend the official opening on Thursday. On Wednesday, almost 7,600 Ukrainians
entered Romania, with more than 2.7 million having crossed the border into this
country since 10th February 2022, two weeks before the Russian
invasion of their country. Most of them continued their journey to western
Europe, while more than 86,000 chose to stay.

Inflation. The National Bank of Romania again
raised the monetary policy interest rate, from 6.25 to 6.75% per year. This is
the highest level in the last 12 years. The National Bank says the move is motivated
by the fact that the rising price of electricity and food has driven the annual
inflation rate upwards to hit 16% in September, above the expected level. The
bank’s experts are expecting the inflation to continue to rise at a slower pace
towards the end of the year before gradually going donwards, but not to fall
under 10% until the first half of 2024.

Fund. The Romanian government approved an emergency order on Romania’s
contribution to the NATO Innovation Fund. Romania made a commitment to this end
at the NATO Summit hosted by Madrid last June, with the measures envisaged
being aimed at boosting the country’s economic growth, with a major
contribution to the development of the research and development system and the
implementation of technological projects. The government’s spokesman Dan Cărbunaru
said Romania’s contribution to the creation of this investment fund amounts to
3.4 million euros, which will form part of the annual budget of the Ministry
for Research, Innovation and Digitalisation. (CM)