September 19, 2016

PM Dacian Ciolos presents report on Romania's economic situation

Newsroom, 19.09.2016, 12:00

REPORT – Romania’s technocratic prime minister, Dacian Ciolos, is today presenting in Parliament a report on the country’s economic situation. Ciolos thus answers a request in this respect by the leader of the leftist Social Democratic Party (PSD), Liviu Dragnea. Almost two weeks ago, Dragnea requested, in an open letter, that the Government should urgently made public its official stand on measures such as setting a maximum ceiling for the statutory maternity pay and increasing taxes on independent activities.

UNITED NATIONS – World leaders are today meeting in New York to discuss sustainable development, curbing violence and terrorism and ways to combat poverty and preserving world peace, at the UN General Assembly. Another important topic for debate is the issue of refugees and migrants. The European Council President, Donald Tusk, will address the UN General Assembly on Wednesday on behalf of the EU and will attend a series of meeting devoted to the refugee and migrant crisis. The US President Barack Obama will host as part of the UN General Assembly a high-level summit to address large movements of refugees and migrants, running from wars and other crisis. According to the UN, around 60 million people had to leave their homes while in the EU alone the number of refugees from Africa and the Middle East exceeded 1 million. Romanian prime minister Dacian Ciolos, accompanied by foreign minister Lazar Comanescu represent Romania at the meeting.

RUSSIAN ELECTION – The ruling United Russia Party, the main pro-Kremlin party, got most of the votes in Sunday’s parliamentary election, 54%, according to partial results. The Communist Party, the nationalist Liberal Democratic Party and the centre-left party Just Russia made it to Parliament. None of these parties is considered an opposition party, given that their MPs are usually voting the same way as United Russia. The voter turnout rate stood at only 47.8% as against 60% five years ago. On the other hand, the Romanian Foreign Ministry has said it does not recognise the legitimacy of the Russian parliamentary election in Crimea. Also, the Romanian Foreign Ministry has once more voiced its support for Ukraine’s independence, sovereignty and territorial integrity and has reminded that Romania does not recognise Russia’s illegal annexation of Crimea and Sevastopol in 2014.

GERMAN ELECTION – Germany’s Christian Democratic Union (CDU), the party of Chancellor Angela Merkel, suffered a sobering defeat in Sunday’s state elections. The Social-Democrats came out first, with 23%, followed by CDU with 18% and the anti-immigrant Alternative for Germany Party (AfD) with 11.5%. According to France Press, Merkel’s decision last year to allow about 1 million refugees into Germany has caused her party to get such poor election results.

DRILL – As many as 200 military with the Romanian Ground Forces and their partners from Ukraine, Hungary and Slovakia are taking part as of Monday in the multinational drill Blonde Avalanche-16 in Satu Mare, in north-western Romania. The drill that will be held for four days is aimed at training troops to deal with the effects of natural disasters and at granting humanitarian aid to the people affected. The exercise has been held every year ever since 2002 based on an accord signed in Budapest by the four countries.

TENNIS – Romanian tennis player Patricia Tig has today defeated New Zealand’s Marina Erakovic 2-1 and has qualified to the second round of Seoul Open, with 230 thousand dollars up for grabs. Another Romanian, Irina Begu, is the competition’s favourite, and she will be up against South Korean Jang Su Jeong. The third Romanian in the competition, Monica Niculescu, will play against Japanese Eri Hozumi on Tuesday.

(Translated by Elena Enache)