EARLY ELECTIONS – Prime Minister and leader of
\nthe National Liberal Party, Ludovic Orban, announced following Friday’s talks
\nwith President Klaus Iohannis that they reached an agreement to kick off
\nprocedures to organize early elections. The Prime Minister said a special task
\nforce will be set up to negotiate with parties to rally their support. Ludovic
\nOrban said the Social-Democratic Party, which holds a fragile majority in
\nParliament, is hindering the legislative process, the only solution being the
\norganization of early elections at a date close to the local elections slated
\nfor May. In another development, the Social-Democrats said they might call for
\na no-confidence vote against the Government, saying the idea of early elections
\nwould plunge Romania into a superficial political crisis. In turn, the Save
\nRomania Union-PLUS Alliance believes early elections might represent the best
\nsolution at present. <\/p>\n
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IRAN-US
\nCRISIS – Ukrainian President Volodimir Zelenski and his French counterpart,
\nEmmanuel macron, on Saturday agreed that French specialists should help decode
\nthe black boxes recovered from the Ukrainian Airlines passenger jet shot down
\non Wednesday, near Teheran, which killed all the 176 people onboard. The Islamic Revolutionary Guard Corps
\nmisidentified the plane as a cruise missile, taking it down with a short-range
\nballistic missile. According to the Fars agency, the Supreme Leade, Ayatollah
\nAli Khamenei, was informed that the tragedy was the result of a human error,
\nand the leader wanted the truth to be made public. Iranian President Hasan Rouhani expressed his
\ndeep regret over the incident which he labeled a great tragedy and an
\nunforgivable error. Ukrainian President Volodimir Zelenski said the culprits
\nmust be held accountable as compensation to the victims’ families. In turn,
\nCanadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau called for justice to be served to the
\nvictims’ families. We recall a Ukrainian airliner crashed on Wednesday shortly
\nafter taking off from Teheran airport, hours after Iran launched a missile
\nattack on two US military bases in Iraq. The plane was bound for Canada via
\nKiev, with most of the passengers on the manifest due to disembark in the
\nUkrainian capital city. <\/p>\n
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RATING – Fitch Ratings has confirmed the ratings for long-term loans in
\nlocal and hard currency at BBB minus, with a stable outlook. The short-term
\nprospect was set at F3. The financial rating agency believes Bucharest has
\nstable income sources, while its growth prospects are in line with Romania’s
\nGDP growth. Bucharest is also the capital and the biggest city in Romania,
\nbeing home to 2.1 million inhabitants with living conditions above the national
\naverage. Over 11% of Romania’s population lives in Bucharest, the city’s GDP
\ncontribution exceeding 20%. The unemployment rate was 1.4% at the end of 2018,
\nand the city boasts numerous job opportunities.
\nThe city’s population is growing, while the GDP per capita is four times
\nthe national average, Fitch also writes. <\/p>\n
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ROMAN-CATHOLIC CHURCH – As of Saturday Aurel Perca
\n(aged 68) has become the new Roman-Catholic Archbishop of Bucharest. To mark
\nthis event a solemn mass was officiated at the St. Joseph Roman-Catholic
\ncathedral in the capital city, attended by thousands of faithful and over 200
\npriests, two cardinals, 24 Catholic bishops, civil and political authorities,
\nrepresentatives of the diplomatic corps and knights of the Sovereign Military
\nHospitaller Order of Saint John of Jerusalem, of Rhodes and of Malta. Aurel
\nPerca was appointed Archbishop of Bucharest by Pope Francis after Ioan Robu
\nturned 75, the canonical age of retirement under the laws of the Catholic
\nChurch. Previously Perca served as auxiliary bishop of Iasi. He was ordained in
\n1979 and named bishop in 1999. Ioan Robu will become an emeritus metropolitan
\narchbishop. <\/p>\n
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OMAN – Romania’s President Klaus
\nIohannis on Saturday conveyed his condolences for the death of Oman’s Sultan,
\nQaboos bin Said al-Said. Haitham bin Tariq al-Said, Qaboos’s cousin, was sworn
\nin on Saturday as the new sovereign leader of Oman, the Government in Muscat
\nhas announced. Oman’s Royal Family decided to open the letter where Qaboos
\ndesignated his successor. The Constitution of Oman stipulates that the Royal
\nFamily can appoint a successor of its own within three days of the throne
\nfalling vacant. Sultan Qaboos of Oman passed away on Friday, aged 79, after
\nnearly half a century of rule. Supported by Western powers, Qaboos ascended to
\nthe throne in 1970, at the end of a bloodless coup, assisted by Great Britain.
\nThe new Sultan, Haitahm bin Tariq, aged 65, a sports enthusiast, served as
\ndeputy secretary of state in the Foreign Ministry before becoming Minister of
\nHeritage and Culture in the mid-90s. In the 1980s Haitham bin Tariq became the
\nfirst president of Oman’s Football Federation. <\/p>\n
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TENNIS – Romanian tennis player Simona
\nHalep will play Germany’s Angelique Kerber in a demonstrative doubles match
\nfeaturing other special guests on Sunday in Adelaide, organizers of the WTA
\ntournament say. The match will be part of the event called The Adelaide
\nInternational Rally for Resilience, meant to raise funds to support the
\nvictims of the wildfires in Australia. 27 people were killed in the raging
\nbushfires and 63,000 square kilometers burned to the ground. World no. 3,
\nSimona Halep is seeded 2nd in the Adelaide tournament, also
\nfeaturing the WTA leader Ashleigh Barty, Czech player Petra Kvitova (WTA no.
\n7), Belinda Bencic of Switzerland (WTA no. 8) and Kiki Bertens of the
\nNetherlands (9 WTA). Halep is now training with her coach, Darren Cahill in
\nAdelaide. <\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
(Translated by V. Palcu)<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
A roundup of domestic and international news<\/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":[35314,35312,33570,33137,28945,30168,35313],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-104081","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-newsflash","tag-adelaide-tournament","tag-aurel-perca","tag-early-elections","tag-fitch-ratings","tag-klaus-iohannis","tag-ludovic-orban","tag-sultan-of-oman"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n