September 30, 2019 UPDATE

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Newsroom, 30.09.2019, 20:35

FUNERAL
Monday was a day of national mourning in France in memory of the former
president Jacques Chirac who died last Thursday at the age of 86. The funeral ceremonies
were attended by President Emmanuel Macron and three
predecessors, including Valéry Giscard d’Estaing, who is 93 years old. Leaders
from around the world also attended the funeral where Romania was represented
by its foreign minister Ramona Manescu. Jacques Chirac was at the forefront of
the French political scene for 40 years, as mayor of Paris, MP, minister and
prime minister. His remarkable career was overshadowed towards the end by a
2-year suspended sentence he received in 2011, when he had already left
political life, for a case of fictitious hiring dating from his time as Paris
mayor. One of the key moments the world will remember him for includes France’s
refusal in 2003 to take part in the US-led invasion of Iraq. Romanians will
remember Jacques Chirac as a great supporter of their country’s joining NATO
and, later, the European Union.

CANDIDACY
Romania’s Prime Minister Viorica Dancila on Monday announced she would nominate
another candidate for the position of European commissioner after the Legal
Affairs Committee of the European Parliament last week had turned down
Romania’s candidate, Rovana Plumb, over a conflict of interest. Prime
Minister Dancila was invited by Romanian president Klaus Iohannis to have talks
on this issue on Wednesday. Last week Plumb was asked to clear some
controversial aspects in her declaration of assets concerning a loan she had
taken to fund an election campaign. On Monday Plumb said she had extinguished
the 168 thousand euro loan over which there was suspicion of a conflict of
interest.

TENNIS Romanian tennis player Simona Halep, the world’s number six, on
Monday lost to Ekaterina Alexandrova of Russia in the second round of the WTA
tennis tournament in Beijing. We recall that Halep has qualified for the sixth
time in a row for the WTA Finals due to take place in Shenzhen over October 27th
and November 3rd. Also in the doubles on Monday Romanian Monica
Niculescu and Vania King of the USA lost to Jelena Ostapenko of Latvia and Dayana
Yastremska of Ukraine; Raluca Olaru also from Romania and Alison Riske of the
USA conceded defeat to the all-American pair, Sofia Kenin / Bethanie
Mattek-Sands.

(translated by bill)