Romania’s state and social
\nsecurity budget law has been promulgated by president Klaus Iohannis. The
\nfields that will get the highest amounts next year are education, research,
\nhealth and national security. The 5% pension growth was also provided for in the
\nbudget. The budget is based on a deficit of 3% of the GDP and an economic
\ngrowth rate of 4%. Prime Minister Dacian Ciolos has admitted that the
\ngovernment took into consideration the draft budget sketched by the previous
\ngovernment and has given assurances that the money will be managed in a
\ntransparent, effective and cautious manner.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
The central and east-European
\ncountries that will not accept refugees in keeping with the mandatory quotas
\ncould face legal actions and thus problems might occur with regard to the EU’s
\nopen borders, warns the German Foreign Minister Frank-Walter Steinmeier in an
\ninterview carried by the ‘Der Spiegel’ magazine on Saturday. He also warns
\nthat, in order for the plan of relocation of 160,000 refugees among the EU
\ncountries to be applied, the EU may resort to judicial proceedings. A few days
\nago, the Austrian Chancellor Werner Faymann too stated that the central and
\neast-European countries that did not accept refugees from outside the EU,
\naccording to the established relocation system, might get less EU funding. At
\nthe winter European Council in Brussels, the Romanian Prime Minister Dacian
\nCiolos stated that, although Romania stands by the other EU member states, it
\nwill not take into consideration the
\nmandatory quotas unless the EU proves it can effectively control the migration
\nflow. The International Organization for Migration announced on Friday that over 990,000 refugees and migrants had
\nentered Europe since the beginning of 2015.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
The Timisoara
\nSociety, which has recently joined the NGO called Platform of European
\nMemory and Conscience will call on Romania’s president Klaus Iohannis to
\nrequest, before the country’s Higher Defense Council, the declassification of
\ndocuments and materials concerning the 1989 anti-Communist Revolution. The
\npresident of the organization, Florian Mihalcea, claims there are still many
\nrecordings, photos and other documents that are kept secret. The Platform of
\nEuropean Memory and Conscience is an international NGO set up in 2011,
\nwhich brings together 51 public and private institutions and organizations from
\n18 countries, active in research, fact-finding, awareness raising and citizen
\neducation on totalitarian regimes in Europe in the 20th century. Events
\ncommemorating the heroes of the 1989 anti-Communist Revolution continue in
\nTimisoara, in western Romania. 26 years ago, that was the place where, on
\nDecember 19th, dozens of thousands of people took to the streets in an
\nunprecedented move against the totalitarian regime. The events in Timisoara are
\nseen as the trigger of the Revolution, which culminated in the fall of the
\nCeausescu regime. Over 1,000 people died and more than 3,400 were wounded in
\nthe Revolution.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
The Minister Delegate for
\nRelations with Romanians Abroad, Dan Stoenescu, attended on Friday events
\nmarking 25 years of activity of the Romanian Community in Serbia. On the
\noccasion, the Romanian official voiced gratitude for the activity carried out
\nby the Community towards protecting the Romanians’ rights in fields that are
\nvital for the national identity. The minister delegate reaffirmed the Romanian
\nstate’s determination to collaborate with the Serbian one for the preservation
\nand development of Romanian identity, as well as the importance of supporting
\nthe projects developed and carried out by the Romanian community.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
The UN Security Council has
\nunanimously adopted a resolution regarding peace negotiations between the power
\nand the opposition in Syria. The document calls on the UN Secretary General Ban
\nKi-moon to bring together representatives of the Syrian government and
\nopposition to start official negotiations on an urgent political transition
\nprocess. The aim is to actually start negotiations in early January 2016. For
\nalmost five years now, Syria has been devastated by a terrible conflict, which
\nhas claimed over 250,000 lives and has forced millions of people to flee the
\ncountry.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
Moscow believes that the
\ndeployment of the anti-missile defense system in eastern Europe, along the
\nborder between NATO and Russia, is an offense and refuses to accept the
\nexplanation provided by the US and Romania with regard to the strictly
\ndefensive nature of the shield. Recently, the Kremlin has announced it has the
\nnecessary means to penetrate the protection system, which, the Kremlin says, couldn’t face a
\nlarge number of missiles anyway. On Friday, the anti-missile shield in Deveselu,
\neastern Romania, became functional and is to be rendered fully operational by
\nJuly 2016. The US Ambassador to
\nBucharest stated on the occasion that the anti-missile system was designed to deal
\nwith threats coming from outside Europe, and not to target Russia.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
The
\nRomanian Foreign Ministry is carefully monitoring the situation of the Romanian
\ncitizen whose five underage children were taken away by the child welfare
\nauthorities in Norway. According to the Romanian Ministry, the Romanian Embassy
\nin Oslo approached officials with the Norwegian Foreign Ministry and Parliament
\nto settle the matter. The children were taken from their family following a
\nteachers’ accusation. One of the girls sang a Christian song at school, and the
\nteacher announced the authorities, saying that the children were being religiously
\nindoctrinated by their family. In Bucharest, several hundreds of people
\nprotested in front of the Norwegian embassy on Saturday. <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
\n
\n
\n
\n
<\/p>\n
On Sunday, the Norwegian and
\nthe Dutch teams will play the final of the World Women’s Handball Championship
\nhosted by Denmark. Also on Sunday, the Romanian squad will face the Polish one
\nand will try to win the bronze, as on Friday they lost the semi-final against Norway
\n25-33 and Poland lost to the Netherlands 30-25. Romania is the only country
\nthat has participated in all World Championship editions held since 1957. The
\nnational team won gold in 1962 and silver in 1973 and 2005 respectively.<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A roundup of domestic and international news<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":113,"featured_media":100004,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-100721","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-newsflash"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n