January 26, 2024 UPDATE

A roundup of local and international news.

Newsroom, 26.01.2024, 19:21

Protests. The Romanian government has
adopted several measures aimed at solving the problems that have brought
farmers and transporters to the streets in recent weeks. Money was allocated
for subsidies for animal breeders and the subsidy for diesel fuel used in
agriculture was increased. The money will reach the farmers by the end of June
this year. For farmers affected by last year’s drought, the government adopted
an emergency order that allows them to postpone the payment of their loans to
the banks. It was also decided to change the legal framework so that truck
drivers will no longer be fined for the expiry of the road tax in the case of
long waiting times at customs points and an overall 20% salary increase this
year was agreed for healthcare workers.

Cars. Car production in Romania saw a
record increase last year to pass by more than 4% the total number of cars
manufactured in 2019. Adrian Sandu, the general secretary of the Romanian
Automobile Manufacturers Association, believes that this increase was possible
thanks to the efforts made by the factories Dacia and Ford to find solutions to
the electronic component shortage crisis. Both the Dacia and the Ford
teams did their best to ensure an optimal supply flow of components, so, with
demand constantly on the rise, we are now seeing a new record of production of
vehicles in Romania, about 513,000 units, said Adrian Sandu.

Schengen. Slovakia’s
minister for foreign and European affairs Juraj Blanár said in Bucharest that
his country fully supports Romania’s complete entry into the Schengen area
because it has fulfilled all accession criteria. His talks with his Romanian
counterpart Luminiţa Odobescu also looked at ways to boost cooperation in
sectors such as energy, infrastructure, the car industry, the defence industry
and tourism, as well as in the areas of security and defence. The two also
signed a bilateral programme in the field of education.

Loan. The
European Investment Bank signed a 40 million euro loan with an Austrian company
for the installation of 8,500 electric vehicle charging stations in Romania,
Bulgaria and Lithuania. The project is to be carried out over the next three
years as support for green mobility and the European Green Deal objectives with
respect to sustainable transport and decarbonisation. The project is supported
via the InvestEU programme and will help achieve the goal of having 1 million
public electric vehicle charging stations and alternative fuel stations spread
across the 27 EU member states by 2025. Also, the investment will contribute to
reducing greenhouse gas emissions and air pollution in urban areas in the three
states.

NATO. Sweden will not
negotiate with Hungary over its application to join NATO and which Budapest is
the only NATO member yet to ratify, said Swedish prime minister Ulf Kristersson
on Friday, quoted by Reuters. Together with Finland, Sweden requested to join
NATO in 2022 following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, but its bid has so far
been blocked by Turkey and Hungary. Turkey’s president Recep Tayyip Erdogan
signed the ratification documents on Thursday. The prime ministers of Sweden
and Hungary will meet next week at the EU Council in Brussels, but Kristersson said Sweden would not make new promises with respect to NATO. (CM)