13 December 2015, UPDATE

Three new migrant reception centres will be set up in Romania, adding to the six existing ones.

Newsroom, 13.12.2015, 12:15

Budget. Parliament’s specialist committees on Sunday debated the
2016 budget bill before a vote by the two houses on Wednesday. Liviu Dragnea,
the leader of the Social Democratic Party, which forms Parliament’s largest
group, publicly called on Romania’s technocratic prime minister Dacian Ciolos
to name a date for the increase in the minimum wage by Tuesday at the latest.
Dragnea said he was opposed to the indefinite postponement of this rise, which
the former leftist government had proposed. The Ciolos cabinet said the rise in
the minimum wage from 233 euros to 266 euros cannot be implemented without
first assessing the measure’s economic and budgetary impact. The 2016 budget is
based on an estimated growth rate of around 4% and a maximum budget deficit of
3%.

Migration. Three new migrant
reception centres will be created in Romania, adding to the six existing ones,
the interior minister Petre Toba announced on Sunday. The centres will be
located in Campulung Muscel, Tasnad and Bumbesti-Jiu. The General Inspectorate for Immigration
currently runs six centres in Bucharest, Somcuta Mare, Radauti, Galati,
Timisoara and Giurgiu. The interior ministry’s budget was approved on Sunday with
no amendments by Parliament’s joint budget and finance committees and stands at
2.58 billion euros.

EU. Romania’s
foreign minister Lazar Comanescu will attend a meeting of Eu foreign ministers
on Monday in Brussels. Talks will focus on the recent developments in the
Eastern Partnership countries following the commitments taken at the latest
summit in Riga last May. Other issues discussed include the European Union
contribution to the fight against terrorism, the support to be given by the
Union to the process of political reconciliation and reform in Iraq, as well as
the situation in Libya.

Euro 2016. Romania and the
host country France will play the opening match at the 2016 European Football
Championship, on June 10th, as the draw was made on Saturday in Paris.
Romania are in Group A, together with Switzerland and first-time qualifiers
Albania. For the first time, 24 nations will contest the tournament, drawn into
six groups of four teams each. The top two in each group plus the four
best-placed sides advance to the round of last 16. Euro 2016 will be held
between the 10th of June and the 10th of July in ten
cities across France. The final will take place on the 10th of July
in Paris. This is Romania’s 5th European tournament, after 1984,
1996, 2000 and 2008. Their best result so far dates from 2000, when they
reached the quarterfinals.

Basketball. For the first time in
history, Romania will host group games of the 2017 Men’s European Basketball
Championship in the western city of Cluj Napoca, the International Basketball
Federation has announced in Munich. Finland, Israel and Turkey will also host
group games, while the final knockout rounds will take place in Istanbul. This
year’s European Basketball Championship was the first to be hosted by multiple
countries, namely France, Germany, Latvia and Croatia. The European title went
to Spain.

(Translated by: C. Mateescu)