October 26, 2014 UPDATE
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Valentin Țigău, 26.10.2014, 12:05
TENNIS — WTA 4th ranked Romanian tennis player Simona Halep lost Sunday’s finals of the Champions’ Tournament in Singapore to Serena Williams of the United States, 6-3, 6-nil. Williams thus got even with Halep after earlier this week she lost 6-nil, 6-2. Simona Halep however managed the best performance in her career, being the only Romanian ever to play in the Champions’ Tournament. As of next week she will be ranked 3rd in WTA standings. Halep this year won the tournaments in Doha and Bucharest and played the finals of the Madrid and Roland Garros fintournaments als and made it all the way to the Wimbledon semi-finals.
VISIT — Romanian Minister for Romanians worldwide Bogdan Stanoevici is as of Sunday on a three-day official visit to Italy, in Turin and Florence. According to the Romanian Foreign Ministry, Stanoevici will meet with representatives of the associative community and with the president of the Tuscany region Enrico Rossi and other local officials. On Friday and Saturday, Bogdan Stanoevici was in Austria where he met with representatives of the Romanian communities, visited the Romanian Orthodox parishes in Graz and Knitellfeld and met with Romanian artists in Vienna.
AGRICULTURE – Prime Minister Victor Ponta on Sunday told a televised show on the public station that in 2014 agriculture would remain, alongside the energy sector, one of the main engines of economic growth. Victor Ponta expressed support for Romania’s bio food sector, recalling that bulk exports are currently the largest threat facing this sector. The Prime Minister went on to say that the Government and the Agriculture Ministry plan on increasing financial support for both bio-food producers and processors.
RESPONSE — The Romanian Foreign Ministry has severely condemned the terrorist attack in the northern Peninsula of Sinai on October 24, which killed many Egyptian soldiers and wounded scores of others. The ministry expressed its solidarity with the efforts of the Egyptian authorities to combat terrorist activities. Egypt on Friday has declared a three-month state of emergency in Sinai, a hotbed of jihadist militants, after 30 soldiers were killed in a suicide bomb attack. Since Islamist president Mohamed Morsi was ousted in July 2013, Egypt has been the stage of a series of terrorist attacks against the security forces, despite the army’s offensive in the Sinai Peninsula.
HEAVY RAINFALLS — At least one person was killed in the large-scale floods that hit south-eastern Bulgaria this weekend. Road traffic was disrupted in the north while an emergency alert has been called in two regions in the centre. Hundreds of households were cut off from the power grid. Greece too has been affected by flooding and strong wind, with severe damages reported in Athens and Thessaloniki.
WINTER TIME — Romania on Sunday switched to the official wintertime under daylight saving time. This globally used time is aimed at effectively using natural light and reducing electricity consumption. Romania will revert to the official summer time in March. The method was first used during the Great War in 1916 in several countries in Europe and introduced in Romania in 1931.
