September 24, 2014
A roundup of domestic and international news
România Internațional, 24.09.2014, 12:01
14 candidates will be running for president of Romania this November, the Central Electoral Bureau announced on Tuesday night, right after the deadline for submissions of candidacies expired. The favourite in the race is the current Prime Minister of Romania, the Social Democrat Victor Ponta. Next comes the main representative of the center-right opposition, Klaus Iohannis, the mayor of Sibiu, in central Romania. The first round is scheduled for November 2nd, and the second for November 16th. More on this after the news.
The proceedings of the 69th UN General Assembly start today in New York, at the request of the US President Barack Obama. The main issues on the agenda of talks are international terrorism and the UN’s activity over the past year. Participating are heads of state and government, foreign ministers, high-ranking officials, business leaders, celebrities, media representatives. Romania is represented at the summit by Prime Minister Victor Ponta. Today, he will meet representatives of the Romanian community and tomorrow he will present before the general assembly Romania’s stand with regard to the international situation and climate changes. On Friday, the Prime Minister will travel to Houston, where he will hold talks with representatives of big American power companies, whom he will try to convince to come to Romania as investors.
Romanian Foreign Minister Titus Corlatean has attended the informal meeting of the EU Foreign Ministers hosted by New York, on the sidelines of the UN summit. During the talks on the Ukranian crisis, Minister Corlatean stressed the importance of observing the cease-fire agreement, as a solution to avoid a new frozen conflict in the Black Sea area and stressed Romania’s firm support to the Kiev authorities in overcoming this difficult moment. Also, the Romanian Foreign Minister reasserted Romania’s stand regarding Moldova’s European integration efforts.
The US has launched new air strikes in Iraq, but also in Syria, against the Islamic State jihadists. US officials have announced that the Khorasan group, a branch of Al-Qaeda, was also targeted, which was planning imminent terrorist attacks. Fiver Arab states, Saudi Arabia, the United Arab Emirates, Jordan, Bahrain and Qatar, participated in the strikes, the US President Barack Obama has said. In another move, Turkey and Great Britain have announced their rapid involvement in the actions aimed at neutralizing the Islamic state, which has committed dozens of crimes, some of them as public executions.
A large scale NATO exercise is due to start today in Poland. Participating are over 12 thousand people, of which 750 soldiers from another 8 states members of the alliance, namely Estonia, Lithuania, the Netherlands, the Check Republic, Hungary, Canada, Great Britain and the US. Organized every two years since 2006, under the code name of Anaconda, the exercise’s goal is to prepare the rapid reaction forces for emergency situations. Poland and the Baltic countries have several times voiced worries about their security, following Russia’s annexation of the Crimean peninsula and the support granted by Moscow to separatists in eastern Ukraine. At the summit in June, NATO announced the setting up of a permanent military presence in region, including in Romania.
The RadiRo International Festival of Radio Orchestras continues in Bucharest today with the performance of another prestigious orchestra: the Stuttgart Symphony Orchestra, which in the 70s was headed by the great Romanian conductor and composer Sergiu Celibidache. The orchestra is now headed by Stephane Deneve and will perform alongside two big artists: violinist Nikolaj Znaider and Romania mezzo-soprano Ruxandra Donose, who has been recently awarded by the prestigious Gramophone magazine. On Tuesday, performing on the same stage were the Prague Radio Orchestra and Romanian pianist Horia Mihail. RadiRo, the only European festival devoted entirely to radio orchestras, brings together famous orchestras from Finland, France, Romania and the Check Republic.
