June 15, 2015 UPDATE

Some of the top stories in Romania today

Newsroom, 15.06.2015, 12:15

Romanian President Klaus Iohannis, who started a two-day visit to Croatia on Monday, said
he would convey to the Croatian officials Bucharest’s wish to give a new
impetus to bilateral dialogue and boost regional cooperation. This is Iohannis’
first visit to Balkans since taking office and the first to Croatia by a
Romanian president since this country joined the European Union. His agenda
includes talks with his counterpart Kolinda Grabar-Kitarovich, prime minister
Zoran Milanovich and Parliament speaker Josip Leko. On Tuesday, the Romanian
president will lay a wreath at a major memorial dedicated to the
Croatian victims of war.

Romania’s
foreign minister Bogdan Aurescu attended a ministerial meeting of the
Central European Initiative held on Monday in Ohrid, in Macedonia. Talks
focused on regional developments in South-Eastern Europe, the Initiative’s role
and activities and regional inter-connectivity. In his speech, Aurescu
emphasised the importance of regional cooperation and Romania’s support for the
programme and priorities of the Macedonian presidency of the Central European
Initiative. He said Romania supported the inter-connection of the region’s
infrastructure networks and their integration into the European Union system.
On the sidelines of the meeting, he also met some of his counterparts from the
participating countries. The Central European Initiative is a forum of regional
cooperation that brings together 18 states, including 10 EU (Austria, Bulgaria,
the Czech Republic, Croatia, Italy, Poland, Romania, Slovakia, Slovenia and
Hungary) and 8 non-EU member states (Albania,
Belarus, Bosnia and Hertegovina, Macedonia, the Republic of Moldova,
Montenegro, Serbia and Ukraine).

The president of
the Republic of Moldova Nicolae Timofti on Monday hailed the vote of the
Moldovan citizens, which went mainly to the pro-European parties in Sunday’s
local elections. He called on the pro-European parties to agree on a
parliamentary majority and form a new government, following the resignation of
prime minister Chiril Gaburici. The head of the EU delegation to Chisinau
Pirkka Tapiola also called on the Moldovan authorities to hold talk on the
formation of a parliamentary majority as soon as possible. According to
Monday’s results, the pro-European parties won two thirds of Moldova’s rayons.
In the capital Chisinau, the current pro-European mayor Dorin Chirtoaca and the
former Communist prime minister Zinaida Greceannyi, who is supported by the
pro-Russian socialists, will be the contenders for the second election round on
June 28. In the first round, the pro-Russian left won major victories in the
cities of Balti, in the north, and Orhei, in the south.

A Romanian Air Force squadron consisting of 22 military, pilots and technical and logistics staff and a Spartan cargo plane take part in the multinational European Air Transport Training exercise under way until the 26th of June in the Portuguese city of Beja. The exercise, which is attended by 550 soldiers from 11 European countries (Romania, Belgium, Finland, France, Germany, Italy, Lithuania, Britain, Holland, Portugal and Sweden), will enable the training of tactics and procedures in the area of daytime and night-time transport missions, low level flights, short-field landing, coordination between air and land forces and response to threats from the air or the ground.

Faced with a possible stockpile of American
heavy weapons in Eastern Europe and the Baltic states, Russia would be left
with no other option but to boost its troops and forces on the western
flank, said general Yuri Yakubov, a senior official with the Russian
defence ministry. He described the plan as the most aggressive step by the
Pentagon and NATO since the Cold War. Yakubov made these comments following
information in the western media that the US plans to deploy tanks, artillery
and other heavy weapons in Estonia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania,
Bulgaria and possibly also Hungary.

Romanians
commemorated on Monday 126years since the death of their national
poet, Mihai Eminescu, considered the last of the European Romantics. Cultural
institutes all over the country held literary seminars, poetry recitals and
theatre performances inspired by the great poet’s work. The majority
Romanian-speaking Republic of Moldova also commemorated the event, as well as
Romanian communities all over the world. The poet’s birthday, January 15th,
has been declared by Romania and Moldova Day of National Culture.

The Performance Market opened on Monday as part of the
International Theatre Festival under way in Sibiu. The market brings together
more than 130 performers, companies and cultural managers from 13 different
countries who will be presenting their productions and projects until Saturday.
The festival, which is in its 22nd year and comes to an end on
Sunday, features tens of theatre, dance, music and circus performances, as well
as exhibitions, conferences and book and film launches. More than 60 venues are
used, including public squares, churches, historical sites, cafes and bars and
conventional performance halls. The Sibiu Theatre Festival is the most complex annual
festival held in Romania, being recognised internationally as the third biggest
in Europe in terms of scope and size, after Britain’s Edinburgh and France’s
Avignon festival.

The Romanian tennis player Simona Halep, number 3 in the
world, is seeded first in the WTA Premier tournament in Birmingham worth
665,000 dollars, which began on Monday. Halep goes straight into the second
round, where faces Britain’s Naomi Broady (world no. 224), who defeated
Croatia’s Ajla Tomljanovic (world no. 79) on Monday. The main draw features two
other Romanian players: Irina Begu, ranked 29th in the world, who
plays against Daniela Hantuchova of Slovakia in the first round, and
Monica Niculescu, ranked 61st, who plays against the Czech player
Barbora Zahlalova-Strycova.