February 25, 2017 UPDATE

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Newsroom, 25.02.2017, 19:20

MIGRATION 8 Syrian citizens were discovered on Saturday by Romanian policemen while trying to illegally cross the border into this country in a minibus. The minibus, which was driven by a Bulgarian national, was bound for Germany. The 8 Syrians with ages ranging from 15 to 30 years have confessed that they have paid 16 thousand euros each to be taken to Germany, a police communiqué says.

VISIT Romania’s Foreign Minister Teodor Melescanu, on Monday will be paying a formal visit to Budapest for talks with his Hungarian counterpart, Peter Szijjarto and Prime Minister Viktor Orban. For the first time, the Romanian official will deliver a speech at the annual meeting of the Hungarian diplomacy. During the talks, the head of the Romanian diplomacy will be pleading for stepping up political-diplomatic dialogue and boosting economic cooperation particularly in fields like energy or infrastructure. The two sides are expected to also tackle the issue of national minorities’ rights. Melescanu is also to meet representatives of the Romanian community in Hungary with whom he will discuss their preoccupation for maintaining their ethnic, cultural, religious and linguistic identity as well as ways through which the Romanian state can support them.

MUSEUM Brukenthal, a national museum based in Sibiu, central Romania, on Saturday celebrated 200 years of existence. This is the oldest museum in Romania and some of Europe’s first. It was opened upon the last will of baron Samuel von Brukenthal, a Saxon lawyer and governor of Transylvania between 1777 and 1778. The massive baroque palace, which is housing the museum, with its famous collections of paintings, old books, coins, stamps and maps, was also built in Sibiu’s square around that year. We recall that in 2007 Sibiu and Luxembourg were European capitals of culture.

HANDBALL The International Handball Federation announced that Swedish Isabelle Gullden currently playing for CSM Bucharest and Romanian Cristina Neagu who is to join the team in the next season had been nominated for the IHF Best Handball Player of the year. We recall that Neagu, 28, was also nominated the world’s best handballer in 2010 and 2015. Gullden also 28 was the best scorer of the Champions League’s last edition.

DRILL Romanian and US troops will be attending a joint drill at the Mihail Kogalniceanu air base in southeastern Romania, part of the Atlantic Resolve operation aimed at strengthening NATO’s eastern flank. According to the Defence Ministry in Bucharest, Tuesday will see operations of loading and gunships attacks involving Black Hawk helicopters belonging to the 10th US brigade, the first big army unit deployed to Eastern Europe as part of the Atlantic Resolve operation. In another move, a 20 strong Romanian infantry unit will join the international drill Dynamic Front ll due in Germany between February 26th and March 10th. The drill involves the participation of nearly 1400 military from the Czech Republic, France, Germany, Italy, Lithuania, Great Britain, Romania, the USA and Turkey.