November 2, 2015
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Newsroom, 02.11.2015, 12:00
This is the third day of national mourning in Romania, commemorating the victims of the fire that occurred Friday night at a club in Bucharest. According to the latest reports 30 people died and 150 were injured. Ninety patients admitted in 12 hospitals in the capital city are in a critical or severe condition and the number of deaths may further increase. Prosecutors and the police have opened an investigation and are hearing the witnesses. The tragedy prompted an impressive mobilisation of the Romanian doctors, helped by fellow physicians from Israel and France, and the number of blood donors has tripled. Many countries have sent their condolences to the victims families.
The former Romanian minister for regional development and tourism Elena Udrea has been heard today at the National Anti-Corruption Directorate in a corruption investigation involving a 3 million euro loan taken out from the private bank BRD. She is facing charges of accessory to abuse of office. Thirty people are prosecuted in this case for the fraudulent contracting of 17 loans. This is the fourth case against Elena Udrea opened by the anti-corruption prosecutors, after the ones known as Microsoft, Gala Bute and Hidroelectrica, in which the former minister was prosecuted on Friday. A close aide of former president Traian Basescu and very influential during his ten years in office, Udrea is one of the highest-profile Romanian politicians probed into for corruption.
The number of foreign tourists arriving in Romania grew by nearly 20% in the first 9 months of the year, according to the National Statistics Institute. Arrivals in September 2015 were 18.5% higher than in the same months of the previous year. However, in 2014 for example, the money spent by foreign tourists across Romania, around 1.1 billion euros, accounts for less than the total incomes of Disneyland Paris – 1.3 billion euros, the INS explains. According to the World Tourism Organisation, Romania has a share of 0.3% in world tourism in terms of the number of tourists and 0.4% in terms of revenues from tourism. In other news, as of today Romania is taking part in World Travel Market 2015 (WTM). This is the second-largest travel fair in the world, bringing together over 180 countries and more than 50,000 experts. Romania has a 308 sq.m. stand at this fair.
The European Union Monday promised to work with the new government in Ankara, after the early legislative elections held Sunday in Turkey. According to the EU, the elections, won by the Justice and Development Party (AKP) have confirmed the Turkish peoples strong commitment to the democratic process. The EU promised to join efforts with the new government to improve its partnership with Turkey and carry on bilateral cooperation, to the benefit of all citizens. PM Ahmet Davutoglu and President Recep Tayyip Erdogans Justice and Development Party won 49.4% of the votes and is to hold 316 of the 550 seats in Parliament. The Republican Peoples Party (CHP) came out second, with 24.5% of the votes, followed by the Nationalist Action Party with around 12%. The pro-Kurdish HDP carried little over 10% of the votes.
The Liberal-Democrats in the Republic of Moldova are yet to decide whether they will take part in the negotiations with the Democratic Party and the Liberal Party to form a new ruling coalition. Sworn in less than 3 months ago, the Cabinet headed by the Liberal Democratic Party leader Valeriu Streleţ was brought down on Thursday through a no-confidence motion tabled by the Socialists and the pro-Russian Communists, but also backed by the Democrats. On Friday, President Nicolae Timofti appointed the Liberal deputy-PM Gheorghe Brega as interim prime minister. He said the priority for the Republic of Moldova is to form a new pro-European government as soon as possible.
Some of the victims of the Egypt plane crash have been repatriated to Russia today. The Airbus A 321 operated by the Russian airline Metrojet, with 224 people on board, crashed on Saturday shortly after taking off, in the Sinai region in Egypt. It was carrying Russian tourists who had spent their holidays in the Egyptian resort of Sharm el-Sheikh back to Sankt Petersburg. All the passengers and crew died. The investigation, in which Russian experts are also taking part, is difficult, because the remains of the aircraft are scattered on a 20-km area. The two black boxes have been recovered and will be analysed in Moscow. This is the worst crash in the history of Russian aviation. A similar accident took place in 1985, when an Aeroflot plane went down in Uzbekistan, killing 200 people.
