April 16, 2014
For a roundup of domestic and international news, click here.
Mihai Pelin, 16.04.2014, 12:00
UKRAINE – Ukrainian interim Prime Minister Arseni Iateniuk has today accused Russia of exporting terrorism” to Ukraine, of raising another Berlin wall in Europe and of wishing a return to the cold war. Russian Foreign Minister, Serghei Lavrov said today that the model of the command state in Ukraine has ceased to exist”. He upholds the transition to a federal structure, prior to the international negotiations over the Ukrainian crisis scheduled in Geneva on Thursday. Meanwhile, pro-Russian separatists today continue to storm government buildings in several cities in the Eastern Russian-speaking region of the country. A group of masked gunmen have today seized the building of the City Council in Donetsk and a column of armoured personnel carriers and a truck with gunmen without insignia flying Russian flags have driven into the city of Slovyansk. This morning, Ukrainian forces re-took control of the Kramatorsk military airfield in the East after clashes with pro-Russian armed groups. On Tuesday, Kiev started an anti-terrorist operation in Eastern Ukraine, where in the last few days lots of revolts of pro-Russian activists have been reported. They demand the holding of a referendum to obtain the autonomy of the Russian-speaking regions within Ukraine or their annexation by Russia.
VISIT – Romanian Defense Minister, Mircea Dusa is today visiting the Romanian military recently wounded in Afghanistan at the American regional medical Centre in Landstuhl, Germany. On that occasion, Minister Dusa will bestow the Honorary Emblem of the Romanian Army on the commander of the medical centre, colonel Judith Lee. The Romanian Defense Minister will also promote second lieutenant Ionut Alin Marinescu and will grant the Merit Emblem in the Service of Peace, the first class, to corporals Marius Bogdan Radu and Eugen Valentin Patru. Also today, the Romanian Minister is meeting major general Richard Longo, deputy commanding general of the US Land Forces deployed in Europe and commander of the US Land Forces within NATO. At the moment, some 1000 Romanian military are deployed in Afghanistan, who are going to pull out by the end of 2014.
INSOLVENCY LAW – The Romanian Chamber of Deputies has passed a draft law on the procedures for insolvency prevention and application for legal persons. The National Liberal Party and the Liberal-Democratic Party have voted against the law, announcing they will refer the matter to the Constitutional Court. Attending the parliamentary debate, Justice Minister Robert Cazanciuc said the insolvency law supported the business environment, providing businesses with more efficient tools for getting back their debts. In another development, Prime Minister Victor Ponta announced that a tax exemption for reinvested profits would come into force on July 1st.
STRIKE IN THE RAILWAY SECTOR – Unionists from the Romanian state-owned Freight Railway Company threaten they will go on strike after April 23rd unless the new labour agreements are concluded by that time. Employees also complain about the increasingly precarious working conditions and low wages. The company’s board intends to make redundant some 23000 employees starting this summer.
NAVAL ACCIDENT – Two people were killed and several others are missing after a ferryboat had today sunk off the South Korean cost. The ship had over 470 people on board, most of whom were high school students on a field trip. The ferry linked the port of Incheon in the west to the tourist island of Jeju in the south. The cause of the shipwreck has not yet been established. One explanation the authorities are considering is that the ship might have collided with a rock or another ship. Hundreds of ferries ensure the connection between coastal South Korea and the islands nearby everyday, while accidents are scarcely reported. In 1993, 300 people died after their ferry had sunk off the western South Korean coast.
NEW EU DIRECTIVE – The European Parliament has adopted a new directive whereby granting additional pension rights to workers relocating to other member states. The current EU legislation in this field stipulates that any workers relocating to another Member State will not lose their statutory pension rights, although there is no law regulating their contributions to supplementary pension schemes, financed or co-financed by employers. Under the new legislation, pension rights should be vested after three years of employment at the latest. Moreover, The European Parliament has also included a clause safeguarding the pension rights of cross-border workers, which Member States have four years to implement. The new directive will come into force within 20 working days of its publication in the Official Journal of the European Union.
MATHS OLYMPIAD – Romania’s female team ranked 3rd at the third European Girls Mathematics Olympiad in Antalya, Turkey. The Romanian team made up of four students from the International Computer Science High School in Bucharest won 2 gold medals, a silver medal and a bronze one. 23 European countries and 6 invited countries including the USA and Japan took part in the Olympiad this year.
