September 25, 2019 UPDATE
A roundup of domestic and international news
România Internațional, 25.09.2019, 20:05
UN General Assembly – On Wednesday, the Romanian President Klaus Iohannis delivered a speech at the 74th UN General Assembly, underway in New York. He reiterated Romanias commitment to multilateralism and international order based on norms, with the UN in the center. Talking about climate change, president Iohannis said that Romanias goal was to implement, by 2050, interconnected economic, social and environmental policies, that would ensure sustainable development, a high standard of living for citizens and a good quality of the environment. Iohannis also talked about the need for peace and security, stating that Romania remained firmly committed to acting as a pillar of stability in its region. Romania has been participating in UN peace-keeping operations around the world, from Afghanistan to Sudan, Georgia, Haiti and, as of October, Mali. Bucharest, the Romanian president also stated, is worried about the global spread of terrorism and firmly condemns any terrorist attack.
Visit – The Romanian PM Viorica Dancila is on a working visit to the US. On Tuesday she had a meeting with the secretary general of the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development (OECD) Angel Gurria. During the meeting, Ms. Dancila stressed that Romania continued to be firmly committed to its goal of joining the organization and was ready to start negotiations on the matter. According to a government communiqué, the Romanian official highlighted Romanias positive economic developments, the results of the reform program and the active participation of institutions from Romania in the activities, projects and programs of the OECD structures, as well as in the organizations regional and global initiatives. PM Dancila also met with the US Secretary of Energy Richard Perry, with whom she signed a document in the field of civilian nuclear energy. During the meeting, the Romanian official expressed the Romanian governments determination to develop the economic dimension of the US – Romania Strategic Partnership.
No-confidence motion – On Wednesday, the Social Democrat PM Viorica Dancila said that the no-confidence motion filed against her government would not pass, because, she said “the opposition has no idea about what it is supposed do the next day”. The initiators of the motion believe that the current government is the worst that Romania has had in the past 30 years and claim that the opposition will start rebuild the country from the ground up, soon after its removal. Also, the document reads that the current executive has no parliamentary majority and no political legitimacy to govern the country. The president of the opposition National Liberal Party, Ludovic Orban, has announced that more than 233 signatures have been collected in support for the motion, which is the minimum required to oust the cabinet.
Electoral Bureau – In Bucharest, the Central Electoral Bureau is dealing with potential appeals against some of the candidacies for the November 10th presidential elections. On Friday, the Bureau is to announce the final list of candidates. So far, the Bureau has validated 14 candidates. On Tuesday, it rejected two candidacies and announced officially that it would file a complaint with relevant institutions after finding similarities between the signatures submitted by several candidates.
Brussels – The negotiating teams of the EP and the EU Council reached an agreement on Tuesday evening regarding the appointment of the Romanian Laura Codruţa Kövesi as head of the first European Public Prosecutors Office, reads a communiqué issued by the European Parliament. The negotiations over the appointment of the new European prosecutor started in spring. Despite opposition from the EU ministers until recently, the EPs negotiating team has supported Laura Codruţa Kövesi from the very beginning.
EC – The European Commissioners designated by Romania and Hungary, Rovana Plumb and Laszlo Trocsanyi respectively, have been invited to participate on Thursday in an extraordinary hearing by the European Parliaments Legal Affairs Committee. The hearing is aimed at shedding light on some controversial aspects in their declarations of assets. Most of the candidates for European Commissioners have been heard by the committee, and two received recommendations to clarify their situation. Each candidate must present a declaration of wealth and only if there is no conflict of interest they can pass on to the next stage, namely the hearings in the EP, scheduled between September 30th – October 8th. Rovana Plumb was designated to handle the transports portfolio in the future European Commission headed by Ursula von der Leyen.
DIICOT – The Romanian Directorate for Investigating Organized Crime and Terrorism (DIICOT) has announced it has called on the FBI for help with an expertise to establish the genetic profile of Luiza Melencu, the 18 year old girl about whom nobody knows nothing since she got on Gheorghe Dincas car two months ago. The 66 year-old man stated, when he was apprehended, that he had killed two teenage girls and incinerated them. DIICOT has announced that bone fragments have been sent to the FBI for analysis. The Romanian forensic specialists have not managed to establish whether the bone fragments found in a forest near Caracal, in southern Romania, belong to Luiza, as Gheorghe Dinca had claimed.
