April 1, 2015
Click here for a roundup of news from Romania and the world
România Internațional, 01.04.2015, 12:00
President Recep Tayyip Erdogan of Turkey is on a formal visit to Romania, the first by a Turkish head of state in the last seven years. He is accompanied by a delegation including ministers, MPs and businessmen. The Turkish president will meet president Klaus Iohannis and Prime Minister Victor Ponta. The talks will focus on regional security against the backdrop of Crimea’s annexation to Russia and the Ukrainian crisis. In 2011, Romania signed the joint Declaration of the Strategic Partnership with Turkey and in 2013, it signed the partnership plan of action. High on the agenda are also trade relations and Bucharest’s support for the moves undertaken by Ankara to join the European Union. Also today, president Erdogan will attend the Romania-Turkey Buisness Forum. Two-way trade amounts to over two billion Euros a year, which makes Turkey Romania’s main trade partner outside the EU. More than 13,000 companies with Turkish capital were registered in Romania in mid-2014.
The Senate and the Chamber of Deputies of Romania’s Parliament are today meeting in joint session to amend the MP’s Statute. The amendments refer to the procedures regarding the endorsement of the MPs’ detaining and arrest. Senators have complied with the request of the National Anti-Corruption Directorate prosecutors for the former finance minister, Social-Democrat senator, Darius Valcov, currently in house arrest, to be detained and taken in preventive custody, and for his prosecution to be extended. He is accused of practices incompatible with his office of minister and MP. Deputies will have to vote on the request of the National Anti-Corruption Directorate prosecutors for the deputy of the National Democratic Union of Ethnic Hungarians in Romania, Marko Attila to be detained and taken in preventive custody. He is accused of abuse of office in the illegal retrocession file.
The National Bank of Romania has today decided to cut down on the monetary policy interest rate from 2.25% to 2%, which is another historic low. According to the National Bank, the decision aims to secure medium term price stability, so as to support economic growth, by restoring confidence and boosting loaning included. The Governor of the National Bank of Romania, Mugur Isarescu said that that might not be the last cut in the key interest rate. In another development, Isarescu said that the tax relaxation measures laid down in the new Fiscal Code endorsed by the government must be sustainable. He went on to say that the Central Bank was closely following the recent developments in Greece and Austria since those two countries had a large share of the capital invested in the Romanian banking system and was ready to step in if the banks of those countries had troubles.
On April 1st, the European milk market has been liberalized through the scrapping of milk quotas in the EU member countries. The measure is designed to trigger the drop in the prices of dairy products in the EU. Romanian farmers are afraid the scrapping of milk quotas will make them go bankrupt and the market will be seized by the multinational processors in the milk industry. However, Agriculture Minister Daniel Constantin claimed there were no reasons for the farmers to worry. He said that the cut in the VAT for food products, milk included, from 24% at present to 9% would have a beneficial effect and entail the growth of milk consumption. He went on to say that milk collecting from farmers needed to be improved.
The president of the European Council, Donald Tusk said today that the economic situation of Greece was further under control. However, he estimated that no agreement will loaners would be signed before late April, FP reports. Greece and EU and IMF loaners have failed to reach an agreement on the disbursement of the bailout, after the loaners described the reform package submitted by the Greek authorities as a set of ideas and not a concrete plan, Greek officials quoted by Reuter’s said on Tuesday. If it cannot talk loaners into providing financial aid, Athens risks defaulting. At the moment, the total foreign debt of Greece amounts to around 315 billion Euros, that is about 170% of the GDP.
Romanian tennis player Simona Halep, number 3 seed, on Thursday is meeting American Sloane Stephens, seeded 45, in the quarter finals of the WTA tournament in Miami, Florida, the USA with prize money of 5.4 million dollars. The two players have so far met four times and both have won twice. This year, Simona Halep has won the Shenzhen, Dubai and Indian Wells tournaments. The pair made up of Romanian Horia Tecau and Dutch Jean-Julien Rojer will meet the American pair made up of John Isner and Sam Querrey.
