July 13, 2019 UPDATE
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Newsroom, 13.07.2019, 19:30
TENNIS In a first for the Romanian tennis, Simona
Halep on Saturday won the Wimbledon tournament, the third Grand Slam
competition this year after securing a two-set victory 6-2, 6-2, against Serena
Williams of the USA, one of the world’s strongest tennis players who boasts 7
Wimbledon trophies. Halep is the first Romanian to have ever made it to the
women’s finals of this prestigious tennis competition. Another Romanian, Ilie
Nastase, played in Wimbledon men’s finals twice, in 1972 when he conceded
defeat to Stan Smith of the USA and in 1976, when he was defeated by Bjorn Borg
of Sweden. Simona Halep has secured a clear semifinals win against Elina
Svitolina of Ukraine, while Serena Williams has outperformed Barbora Strycova
of the Czech Republic. Halep, a former WTA number one, reaped the Roland Garros
trophy last year. She also became a finalist in Paris twice as well as in
Australian Open in 2018.
CANDIDATE A congress of the Save Romania Union, an opposition
Parliamentary group, on Saturday validated Dan Barna as its candidate for the
presidential election this autumn. The National Council of PLUS, an
extra-parliamentary political group founded by Romania’s former technocratic
Prime Minister Dacian Ciolos also convened on Saturday. Ciolos announced the
PLUS candidate would be elected through electronic voting by all the party
members over July 22nd and 27th. The two political groups
are going to hold talks for the designation of a candidate to represent the USR
PLUS Alliance. We recall that the USR PLUS election alliance came third in
the European Parliament election in May, after the National Liberal Party, the
main right-wing opposition party and PSD, number one in the leftist government
coalition.
WEATHER In the following 24 hours the weather
is going to be cool in Romania and will become unsettled in most of its
territory. Heavy rainfalls, thunderstorms and strong winds are expected in most
of the regions but for the country’s south-east. The highs of the day are
ranging between 20 and 27 degrees Celsius.
ENVIRONMENT Romania’s
capital city Bucharest on Saturday saw the second edition of the march of
environmentally-friendly cars, hybrid and electric, which this year was joined by participants in the We Bike Romania project. These
two marches are part of a larger event entitled SMARTICITY, which is campaigning
for improving air quality in towns and cities across Romania through the
promotion of green transportation. The event was attended by leading figures of
Romania’s political, sporting and artistic life as well representatives of
various NGOs, corporations and diplomats.
(translated by bill)
