6 January 2016, UPDATE

Romanias prime minister Dacian Ciolos travels to Berlin for talks with German chancellor Angela Merkel.

Newsroom, 06.01.2016, 12:15

The Romanian
prime minister Dacian Ciolos
will pay an official visit to Berlin on Thursday for talks with the German
chancellor Angela Merkel. The two officials will discuss, among other things,
ways to strengthen bilateral relations and immigration to Europe. The Romanian
prime minister will also meet members of the Romanian community in Germany and
representatives of the Romanian-German economic forum. Early this year, Dacian
Ciolos will also travel to France and
the Netherlands, the latter country being the new holder of the EU rotating
presidency since January 1st.

Orthodox
Christians, who are the majority in Romania, as well as the Greek Catholic
Christians, celebrated the Feast of Epiphany on Wednesday. Religious services
were held in churches and monasteries to bless the water, which is believed to
have healing and spiritual cleansing powers. On Thursday, Orthodox Christians
will celebrate Saint John the Baptist. He baptised Jesus in the Jordan river,
revealing to people that he was the Messiah. The religious celebrations of the
Epiphany and Saint John the Baptist mark the end of the winter celebrations and
those dedicated to the nativity of Christ. As many as 2 million Romanians are
named after Saint John.

Moldovan president
Nicolae Timofti has given parliamentary parties a week to create a new
parliamentary majority and urged them to respect the pro-European vote of the
Moldovan citizens. On Tuesday, Timofti held a fresh round of talks with
parliamentary parties to nominate a new candidate for the position of prime
minister. On Monday, Parliament failed to appoint a government led by the
businessman Ion Sturza because not enough MPs turned up to vote. If the next
choice of prime minister is not endorsed, president Timofti will have to
dissolve Parliament and call early elections. The former government led by the
Liberal-Democrat prime minister Valeriu Strelet was ousted following a vote of
no-confidence called by the pro-Moscow Socialist and Communist parties, and
also endorsed by the self-proclaimed pro-western Democratic Party.

Judge Mircea Aron is the new president of the Superior Council of
Magistracy in Romania. His vice-president is the prosecutor Luminita Palade.
Mircea Aron has been a member of the Council since 2011 and a magistrate since
1981, while Luminita Palade has been in the Council for two years and serving
as a magistrate since 1994. The priorities of the new leadership are fairness
and transparency in the appointments for the Supreme Court, the General
Prosecutor’s Office and the National Anticorruption Directorate, strengthening
the legal system and supporting changes to legislation in the field of the
judiciary.

Schengen and freedom of movement must be
guaranteed for both citizens and the economy, said the European
migration commissioner Dimitris Avramopoulos. The European Commission agreed
with officials from Germany, Denmark and Sweden to maintain border controls on
the internal borders of the three states for a minimum period. Germany says,
however, that security on the EU external borders is not perfect, in particular
on the border with Turkey and on Greece’s borders and that the refugee
relocation system is not being implemented. Germany, Sweden and Denmark have
reintroduced border controls in the Schengen area saying the massive flow of
migrants is a threat to their internal security.

The Romanian-Dutch pair Horia Tecau and Jean Julien Roger reached the
quarterfinals of the ATP tennis tournament in Doha worth 1.2 million dollars in
prize money. Seeded second, Tecau and Roger will next face the Russian-Spanish
pair Teimuraz Gabashvili and Albert Ramos Vinolas. In the women’s doubles, the
all-Romanian pair Andreea Mitu and Patricia Maria Tig reached the semifinals of
the Shenzen tournament in China worth 500,000 dollars. Alexandra Dulgheru, also
from Romania, has made it to the quarterfinals of the WTA tournament in
Auckland, New Zealand, worth 226,000 dollars.

An alert has been
issued in Romania for heavy precipitation, powerful winds and glazed frost
across the country from Wednesday at noon until Thursday night. Rain is
expected in the south and southeast and snow in the east and northeast and in
the mountains. A code yellow alert for rain is in place in three counties in
the south and southeast from Wednesday night until Thursday at noon. A yellow
code alert was issued for Bucharest and 8 counties in Romania for glazed frost.
Road travel has been disrupted on the national roads crossing these areas.

(Translated by: C. Mateescu)