May 4, 2023

A roundup of local and international news.

Newsroom, 04.05.2023, 13:55

Cereals.
Romanian agriculture minister Petre Daea on Wednesday briefed his visiting
Ukrainian counterpart Mykola Solskyi on a European Commission decision from 2nd
May to introduce exceptional and temporary preventive measures on imports of a
limited number of products from Ukraine. These involve wheat, maize, rapeseed
and sunflower seeds and are aimed at easing the logistical blockages involving
these products in Bulgaria, Hungary, Poland, Romania and Slovakia. The new
European Commission regulations will be in place in all member states until 5th
June. The first meeting between the two ministers took place in Bucharest on 21st
April. They agreed to hold weekly talks on the amounts of products leaving
Ukraine for transit, to provide Romania with complete and accurate data.

Protest.
The employees of the Agency for Payments and Intervention in Agriculture in
Romania today stopped receiving payment applications at the agency’s local and
county branches for one hour in protest against the fact that their salaries
are not in line with those at central level. Protesters say the Agency is one of
the best performing public institutions managing European funds, but the only
one whose salaries are not aligned at central level. Since it was first set up,
the Agency has attracted over 2 billion euros per year for Romanian farmers.
Unless salaries are standardised, they threaten to suspend their activity for
an indefinite period.

Press. The lack of transparency in the funding of the media, especially
from public funds, and the difficulties on the market undermine the feasibility
of information and trust in the media, shows a Reporters without Borders
assessment of Romania, while noting that the Romanian media landscape is
diverse and pluralistic and provides fertile ground for strong public interest
investigations. Romania is ranked 53rd out of 180 in a World Press
Freedom Index compiled by Reporters without Borders.

Shooting.
Serbia declared three-day mourning in memory of the victims of the massacre
committed yesterday at a school in Belgrade, where a 14-year-old schoolboy shot
dead eight children and the school’s security guard and wounded six other
classmates and a teacher. The incident caused immense shock in Serbia, where,
despite the large number of weapons owned by the population, gun incidents are
rare. In the wake of the massacre, president Aleksandar Vučić announced a
number of measures, including lowering the age of criminal responsibility from
14 to 12 and tougher arms and ammunitions regulations.

Defence.
Romanian defence minister Angel Tîlvăr, who ended his working visit to the
neighbouring Republic of Moldova, had talks with his counterpart Anatolie
Nosatîi and president Maia Sandu about the collaboration between the two states
in the areas of security and defence. According to Radio Romania Chişinău, Tîlvăr
underlined that Romania firmly supports Moldova’s European course and stands by
it in reforming its army. In a statement from the Moldovan president’s office,
Maia Sandu said Romania remains a strategic partner in the consolidation of her
country’s defence and security capabilities.

Poll.
54% of Romanians do not support a possible union of Romania with the
neighbouring Republic of Moldova sometime in the future and only 34% are in
favour, shows an opinion poll conducted by Avangarde. If a referendum were to
be held tomorrow on the union with Moldova, 31% of respondents said they would
vote yes and 50% against. 31% said they did not believe Moldova should be
urgently accepted into NATO, 41% believe it should and 30% are opposed
altogether. In the event of a Russian military invasion of Moldova, 56% of
respondents said they are opposed to Romania sending troops and only 29% are in
favour of an intervention. The opinion poll entitled The unionist sentiment in
Romania – anticipating the future was conducted over the telephone between 26th
and 29th April on a nationally representative sample of 850 interviewees
and has a +/-3.4% margin of error, with a confidence level of 95%. (CM)