Referendum. There is a need for a referendum on
\njustice and one will ne held May 26th, at the same time as the
\nelections for the European Parliament, Romanian president Klaus Iohannis said on
\nFriday after consultations with parliamentary parties. In his opinion,
\nRomanians are afraid that the ruling Social Democratic Party is placing the
\ncountry’s judicial system under its control. The Social Democrats’ representative
\nat the talks said Parliament would approve the president’s request. The
\nAlliance of Liberals and Democrats did not attend the talks. On Thursday Klaus
\nIohannis also held talks with the opposition parties, the National Liberal
\nParty, the Save Romania Union and the People’s Movement Party, as well as with
\nthe Democratic Union of Ethnic Hungarians in Romania and the group of national
\nminorities other than the ethnic Hungarians. The president said these parties
\nwere in favour of a referendum. The consultations were held amid frequent legislative
\nchanges to the judiciary initiated by the parliamentary majority and the
\ngovernment formed by the Social Democratic Party and the Alliance of Liberals
\nand Democrats and which have come under harsh criticism from Romania’s European
\npartners. The referendum will tackle several issues, such as banning amnesty
\nand pardon for corruption crimes and banning the issuing of emergency
\nordinances in the area of crimes, penalties and the judicial organisation. <\/p>\n
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EU funding. The European Commission
\nhas approved all projects submitted by the Romanian government, but more could
\nbe done as there are still funds that can be accessed, said the European
\ncommissioner for regional policy Corina Cretu on Friday in Bucharest. She
\nattended an informal meeting of the ministers responsible for managing the
\nEuropean funds, in the context of Romania’s presidency of the Council of the
\nEU. She also said that the European Commission was worried that the
\nnegotiations held so far about the Cohesion Policy did not lead to concrete
\nresults, not even with respect to the provision and content of the future
\nprogramming framework. The Romanian presidency of the Council of the EU is held
\nunder the motto Cohesion, a common European value and emphasises the unity
\nbetween EU member states and the importance of reducing the economic, social
\nand territorial gaps within the Union. <\/p>\n
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Summit. Romania’s prime minister Viorica Dancila on Friday
\nattended a meeting of the heads of government of Central and Eastern European Countries and China known as
\nthe 16+1 format and held in Dubrovnik, Croatia. Dancila welcomed the launch of
\nthe 16+1 coordination mechanism for small and medium-sized
\nenterprises and the cooperation initiative to support the development of small
\nand medium-sized enterprises as part of the China-Central and Eastern Europe
\ninterbank association agreement. The Romanian prime minister also said that the
\npriorities of the Romanian presidency of the Council of the EU includes issues
\nof common interest for the states participating in the 16+1 format, such as the
\nWestern Balkans. She said Romania will host the upcoming meeting of the 16+1
\ndialogue on education to be held on the 17th of May in Timisoara, as
\nwell as the meeting of the 16+1 consortium for higher education, which will
\nalso take place in Timisoara on the 17th and 18th of May.
\n<\/p>\n
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Foreign investment. According to Romania’s Central Bank, direct foreign investment in
\nRomania rose by 47% in the first two months of this year up to one billion euros
\nas compared to 704 million euros in the similar period of 2018. 935 new
\nenterprises with foreign capital were registered in the first two months of the
\nyear, their number being on the rise against the same period last year. Most foreign
\ncapital comes from the Netherlands, Austria and Germany.<\/p>\n
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Military exercise. The biggest NATO exercise at the
\nBlack Sea came to an end on Friday in the military port of Constanta, in
\nsouth-eastern Romania. Sea Shield 2019 interconnected with the Vigorous Warrior
\nexercise, whose aim was to test the collaboration between the military and
\ncivilian forces in situations of rescue at sea. The exercise involved the
\nevacuation of 20 military from the King Ferdinand frigate of the Romanian Navy
\nin the event of a fire on board. A Puma helicopter of the Romanian Navy took
\nover the wounded, who were treated on site by specialised medical staff and
\nthen transferred by helicopter and ambulances to the hospitals in Constanta. <\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A roundup of the main stories in Romania today.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":113,"featured_media":75903,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[22],"tags":[34662,13794,29972,29398],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-103453","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-newsflash","tag-34662","tag-nato","tag-referendum","tag-summit"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n