August 19, 2014
Click here for a roundup of domestic and international news
Mihai Pelin, 19.08.2014, 12:01
Eforie Nord, a seaside resort on the Romanian Black Sea coast is today playing venue for Diaspora Festival, an event staged by the Foreign Ministry in Bucharest. During the Festival 200 representatives of the communities of Romanians living abroad are tackling issues confronting them on a daily basis and the Bucharest’s possible assistance on those issues. Prime Minister Victor Ponta has announced that Bucharest will be hosting a Congress of the Romanians all over the world in late November.
Romania’s football champions Steaua Bucharest will today be playing Bulgarian side Ludogoret Razgrad in a home match counting towards the Champions League play-offs. In Europa League on Thursday Petrolul Ploiesti will be playing Dinamo Zagreb of Croatia, while Astra Giurgiu will be up against Olympique Lyon of France in an away game. Steaua have secured their presence in the Europa League irrespective of the play-off results and have qualified for a European inter-club tournament for the 11th time in a row.
Representatives of Chisinau and Tiraspol are today discussing the situation of the schools with tuition in Romanian in the pro-Russian breakaway region of Transdniester, in the east of the Republic of Moldova, an ex-soviet country with a Romanian-speaking majority. Brokered by the OSCE mission in Moldova, the event is taking place after the OSCE High Commissioner on National Minorities, Astrid Thors has warned that schools with tuition in Romanian might be closed unless the authorities and the secessionists reached a consensus before the beginning of a new school year next month. Against the pressure exerted by the pro-Russian separatists on the Romanian teachers and students, Thors said the right to tuition in one’s native language must be fully observed, and students must not become victims of political disputes. We recall that Transdniester de facto came out of Chisinau’s control in 1992 upon an armed conflict, which left hundred of dead and was settled by the intervention of Russian troops on the secessionists’ side.
Ukrainian forces are making headway with their special operation in eastern Ukraine. The army has surrounded several major cities in Donbas, a region including Donetsk and Lugansk, two strongholds of the pro-Russian militias, which in the morning saw more clashes between the rebels and government troops. In another development, foreign ministers from Moscow, Berlin, Paris and Kiev, who have recently convened in Berlin, have reached a consensus on the entry into Ukraine of the humanitarian convoy of 300 lorries, which is still stationed at the Russian-Ukrainian border. According to Russian Foreign Minister Serghey Lavrov, all sides have agreed on the convoy’s departure, but the problem is the security of the Red Cross personnel, as the convoy’s route is right through the battlefield.
The world’s second seeded tennis player Simona Halep of Romania is the odds-on favourite of the WTA tournament, which has kicked off in New Haven, USA. The Romanian will be playing right in the second leg against Magdalena Rybarikova of Slovakia. Another Romanian player, Irina-Camelia Begu was knocked out in the first round by Caroline Garcia of France in two sets 7-6, 7-6. The 2013 edition of New Haven Tournament, which has 710 thousand dollars in prize money, was won by Simona Halep.
