January 27, 2017
The Romanian government is today adopting the 2017 draft budget, which is to be later submitted to Parliament for debate/ The International Holocaust Remembrance Day is marked in Romania, too
Newsroom, 27.01.2017, 14:20
BUDGET – The Romanian government is today adopting the 2017 draft budget, which is to be later submitted to Parliament for debate. PM Sorin Grindeanu gave assurances that all measures included in the governing program compiled by the ruling majority made up of the Social Democratic Party and the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats have been taken into consideration. The draft budget is based on a 5.2% economic growth rate, and the budget deficit is estimated at 2.96 % of the GDP. The largest sums of money are earmarked for Transports, Agriculture, Healthcare and SMEs. Education, energy, regional development, the interior and foreign ministries, respectively, the Presidential Administration, the two chambers of the Romanian Parliament and the Foreign Intelligence Service will receive less than in 2016. President Klaus Iohannis has voiced criticism about the decrease in the budgets of the national security institutions. On Thursday, the president sent a letter to the prime minister in which he deems the decrease not only unjustifiable but also inappropriate and ill timed.
DEBATE – The Romanian Justice Ministry will organise on Monday a public debate on the draft emergency ordinances on pardoning and amending the Criminal Code and the Criminal Procedure Code. The opposition parties, civil society and the magistrates professional organisations consider the changes are meant to benefit current and potential convicts, from among influential people in the political class or in the administration. In exchange, the Speaker of the Romanian Senate, Călin Popescu Tăriceanu, claims that the adoption of the ordinances will not affect the continuation of the fight against corruption. The talks are held in the context in which Romania is among the first three countries in Europe with the largest number of sentences by the European Court of Human Rights. Most rulings issued by the European Court of Human Rights against Romania refer to the conditions in penitentiaries.
HOLOCAUST REMEMBRANCE DAY – The International Holocaust Remembrance Day is marked today the world over. During WWII, six million Jews and over two million Rroma, people with disabilities and opponents to the policy pursued by Nazi Germany were sent to death. The commemoration also comes as a remembrance of the release of the survivors of Nazi concentration camps in Auschwitz-Birkenau, in Poland, by the Soviet Army, on January 27, 1945. Bucharest is hosting a symposium entitled “New historical discoveries, devoted to the massacre in the Jilava forest. The significance of January 27 is also marked by the Elie Wiesel National Institute for the Study of the Holocaust in Romania, which is organising “The Film Days: The Memory of the Holocaust, until Sunday. We recall that in January 1941, over 120 Jews were killed by legionnaires in Bucharest, and the Jilava forest and the slaughterhouse in Bucharest were turned into execution sites. Only 6 months later, the pogrom was followed by the mass killing of some 13,000 Jews in Iasi, northern Romania.
DIPLOMACY – US President Donald Trump is due to meet in Washington later today with visiting British Prime Minister, Theresa May. Yesterday, on the first day of her visit, in a speech before Republican Congressmen in Philadelphia, Theresa May launched an appeal to the US to renew what she called the special relationship with Great Britain. The British Prime Minister has also underlined the importance of international institutions, among which the UN and NATO, which have been repeatedly criticised by the US president, Donald Trump. She also defended the role played by the World Bank and the International Monetary Fund. Theresa May is the first foreign leader to meet Donald Trump at the White House.
REP. OF MOLDOVA – The pro-Russian president of the Rep. of Moldova, Socialist Igor Dodon, has said he will not cooperate with the government led by Pavel Filip and the pro-European majority in Parliament and that he will use any opportunity to call early legislative elections, in the case of a possible fall of the government. If blocked by the parliamentary majority, Igor Dodon says he is preparing to organise a referendum to revise the Constitution, to enhance its prerogatives, so that he has the right to dissolve Parliament. He also intends to sack Eduard Harunjen from the position of prosecutor general. The press and experts on constitutional law say that Dodon, who was elected in November, tries to instate a dictatorial regime and has started the fight to win supreme power. Under the Constitution of the Republic of Moldova, the president does not have the right to initiate a referendum to revise the Constitution. It can be initiated only by citizens, the government or by a third of the MPs.
HANDBALL – European defending champions CSM Bucharest are today playing Norwegian champions Larvik HK on home turf as part of the Champions League main group phase. After the preliminary matches, CSM Bucharest is bottom of the group tables and needs a series of good results to finish among the groups top four teams, which will eventually allow it to reach the Final Four for the second year in a row. European Champions in 2011, Larvik is third-ranked in the group tables. Ranking first and second are ETO Gyor of Hungary and Krim Ljubljana respectively, each with 6 points, although separated by the goal-average, followed by Larvik and FC Midtjlland of Denmark, each with four points, Team Esbjerg of Denmark and CSM Bucharest, each with two points. (Translated by D. Vijeu)
