July 21, 2014
A roundup of Romanian and international news.
România Internațional, 21.07.2014, 12:00
The centre-right National Liberal Party, the main opposition party in Romania, today chooses its candidate for the presidential elections in November between the current leader of the party and Sibiu mayor Klaus Iohannis and his predecessor Crin Antonescu. The Liberals’ nominee will then have to compete against the nominee of the centre-right Liberal Democratic Party, Catalin Predoiu. The two centre-right parties will merge to create a new National Liberal Party and will have a sole candidate in the presidential elections. In another development, 45% of Romanians agree to the introduction of obligatory voting, according to an opinion poll conducted by INSCOP published today.
According to the foreign ministry in Bucharest, 19 Romanian citizens and their families have been repatriated following the deterioration of the security situation in the Gaza Strip over the last few days. At the request of the neighbouring Hungary, a Hungarian citizen was also repatriated with the group of Romanian nationals. This was the second evacuation operation for Romanian citizens since the start of the conflict in the region. Last week, 84 Romanians and their families were evacuated from Gaza.
Romania remains a firm supporter of the International Criminal Court, said Romania’s foreign minister Titus Corlatean in Bucharest today after talks with the court’s prosecutor Fatou Bensouda. Mr Corlatean highlighted Bucharest’s efforts to promote the International Criminal Court Rome Statute and the court’s activity. According to the Romanian foreign ministry, Romania signed the Rome Treaty in July 1999 and ratified it in 2002, being one of the states with a direct contribution to the enforcement of the Statute. The International Criminal Court is the first and only permanent criminal court and 122 different states have adopted its statute so far.
The Israeli army today killed at least 10 Palestinian terrorists who infiltrated into Israeli territory from Gaza using tunnels. At the same time, the army continued its ground and air operations in the Gaza Strip. According to Radio Romania’s correspondent in the region, 18 Israelis and around 500 Palestinians have been killed so far in the conflict. Army officials have asked the inhabitants of southern Israel to remain in their homes due to security risks. On a diplomatic level, US Secretary of State John Kerry will travel to Egypt as part of efforts to mediate a ceasefire between Israel and the Palestinian organisation Hamas. The authorities in Cairo say they support the Palestinian population in Gaza but that they disagree with Hamas’ terrorist practices.
The UN Security Council is due to vote on a resolution calling on the pro-Russian separatists in eastern Ukraine to allow full and safe access to the site where a Malaysian passenger jet crashed on Thursday. The resolution will call on all states and actors in the region to cooperate fully in relation to the international investigation of the incident. The crash, which the United States blames on the pro-Russian separatists and their supporters, caused the death of all the 298 people on board, mostly Dutch nationals, as well as Australian, Indonesian, British, German, French, Belgian and Philippine nationals and one Romanian with dual citizenship. France, Britain and Germany have threatened to impose new sanctions on Moscow unless president Vladimir Putin convinces the rebels to allow full access to the crash site. A number of states have already expressed their outrage at the way in which the situation has been handled, fearing the evidence may have been tampered with. Ukraine’s prime minister Arseny Yatseniuk said Ukraine is willing to hand over the coordination of the international inquiry to the Netherlands. He said that out of the 272 recovered bodies, 251 are stored in refrigerated rail cars ready to be sent to Amsterdam for autopsy and independent examination.
