December 16, 2014 UPDATE
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Valentin Țigău, 16.12.2014, 20:06
According to Romania’s president Traian Basescu, the swearing-in ceremony for the newly appointed government led by Social-Democrat Victor Ponta has been postponed for Wednesday morning. The Prime Minister had earlier announced the ceremony would take place on Tuesday night but he had to go to Belgrade to take part in a summit of Prime Ministers from Central-Eastern Europe and China. The government endorsed yesterday by the Chamber of Deputies and the Senate in plenary session, is made up of representatives of an alliance, which brings together the Social-Democrats, the National Union for the Progress of Romania and the Liberal Reformist party replacing UDMR, which has withdrawn from the government. The new cabinet includes 8 new ministers, while 14 ministers have kept their seats.
Over 130 people, mostly children, were killed in a Taliban attack on Tuesday against a school run by the army in Peshawar, north-west Pakistan, France Press reports. The attack has been claimed by the Taliban Movement of Pakistan, TPP, the main Islamist rebel group in the country. Romanian Foreign Minister Bogdan Aurescu has sharply condemned the attack, conveying condoleances to the families of the victims also voicing solidarity with the Pakistani people facing such a distresful situation.
The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development (EBRD) has pledged to help countries in Central and Eastern Europe to diversify their natural gas supplies, after Moscow has scrapped the South Stream project, Bloomberg reports. The EBRD will be focusing on kick starting the construction of a gas pipeline between Serbia and Bulgaria. EUSTREAM, a company operating the Slovakia’s gas supply network, has come up with a project called Eastring, on the construction of a 570 kilometer long gas conveyor from Western Europe to the Balkans, via Romania.
The Russian rouble slumped to a new record low of 20% on Tuesday against hard currencies in spite of the central bank’s decision to appreciate interest rate by 6.5%. The depreciation of Russia’s currency is due to the Western sanctions leveled on Moscow but also to the crude price, which on Tuesday went under 60 dollars per barrel. Revenues from crude and gas exports account for half of Russia’s budget, the world’ second biggest crude producer.
The city of Timisoara in western Romania is as of Tuesday celebrating the fallen heroes of the 1989 anti-communist revolution. The first event on the order of the day was a visit to the prison where the first protesters were taken 25 years ago. On Tuesday night people marched with lit torches, retracing the steps of revolutionaries. The authorities’ attempt to evacuate Calvinist priest Laszlo Tokes was the spark that started street protests and fighting between December 16 and 25, which led to the demise of the Ceausescu dictatorship. Over 1,000 people were killed and 3,400 wounded. Romania was the only country in the Eastern Bloc where the demise of the communist regime resulted in bloodshed and in the execution of the leaders.
