Radio România Internațional

Tag: ATP World Tour Finals

  • November 14, 2017

    November 14, 2017

    GDP — In 2017 Romania’s real GDP went up by 2.6% in the third quarter as against the previous quarter, and by 8.8% as compared with the same period last year, according to the National Statistics Institute. In the first nine months this year Romania’s economy grew by 7%. Early this month the National Forecast Commission revised upwards the country’s economic growth prospects for this year, from 5.6% to 6.1%. Also, according to the European Commission, the Romanian economy could go up by 5.3% this year and by 4.2% in 2018. In October the IMF also revised upwards the Romanian economy’s growth estimations for this year, from 4.2% to 5.5%.




    CELEBRATION — Romania celebrates today 139 years since the southeastern province of Dobruja was unified with the country. The province had been, up to that point, under Ottoman rule. In 1878, following the Russian-Romanian-Turkish war, the International Peace Congress in Berlin recognised Romania’s independence and the province of Dobruja together with the tiny Snake Island in the Black Sea as part of its territory. Authorities in the counties of Tulcea and Constanta are staging ceremonies to celebrate this historic event.




    NO-CONFIDENCE MOTION – The National Liberal Party, the main right wing opposition party in Parliament, is today starting negotiations with representatives of other parliamentary parties to support the no-confidence vote against the coalition government made up of the Social Democratic Party and the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats and headed by Mihai Tudose. The Liberal President Ludovic Orban has announced that information campaigns will be organised across the country and protest rallies will be staged in the country and abroad. The Liberals also requested the Ombudsman to challenge the tax reform promoted by the government in the Constitutional Court. Rallies were staged in Bucharest and other cities to protest against the governments new measures and the bills on the amendment of the laws governing the justice system. Both the prime minister Mihai Tudose and the Social Democratic leader Liviu Dragnea said they would not reconsider their planned changes to the tax code, which they say would bring in more revenues to the budget and the pension fund, while also simplifying procedures for businesses.




    QUAKE – Iran has declared a day of mourning for the victims of Sunday’s quake. According to the authorities’ latest report, over 450 people lost their lives after the earthquake struck the country near its Iraki border. The US Geological Survey said the epicentre was about 32 kilometers southwest of the city of Halabjah and measured 7.2. On the Iraqi side, the most extensive damage was in the town of Darbandikhan, in the semi-autonomous Kurdistan Region. Iran is prone to near daily quakes as it sits on many major fault lines. In 2003, a 6.6 magnitude destroyed the historic city of Bam, killing 26,000 people.




    TENNIS – The Romanian-Dutch pair Horia Tecau and Jean-Julien Rojer today face the Finnish-Australian pair Henri Kontinen and John Peers in their second match at the ATP World Tour Finals in London. In their first match on Sunday, Tecau and Rojer lost to the all-French pair Pierre-Hugues Herbert and Nicolas Mahut. This is the fifth time Tecau plays in the World Tour Finals doubles after 2011, 2012, 2014 and 2015, the last time he was there winning the title together with Rojer.




    FOOTBLALL – The Romanian national football squad today take on the similar team of the Netherlands, in a friendly game in Bucharest. On Thursday, November 9, in the city of Cluj, Romania outclassed the national team of Turkey in a test game, 2-nil. Today’s match is the fourth for the Romanian team with Cosmin Contra as head coach, who replaced in September the German Cristoph Daum.


    (Translated by Elena Enache)

  • 19 November, 2015

    19 November, 2015

    World War Two. The Slovakian town of Zvolen, which is home to the largest Romanian
    Armed Forces Cemetery abroad and where over 10,000 Romanian soldiers are
    buried, today hosts events to pay tribute to the Romanian military who
    contributed to the liberation of Czechoslovakia in the Second World War. The
    presidents of Romania and Slovakia, Klaus Iohannis and Andrej Kiska respectively,
    will lay down flowers and award decorations to a number of war veterans. On
    Wednesday in Bratislava, Iohannis said Romania and Slovakia are not
    destinations for refugees. The Slovakian president said the European states
    must be united and take measures to prevent events like those in Paris from
    happening again. Romania’s president also had talks with Slovakia’s prime
    minister Robert Fico and representatives of young Romanian professionals
    working in Bratislava.




    Government. The adoption of a series of administrative regulations will be the first
    actions of Dacian Ciolos’ technocratic government that has just come to power
    in Bucharest. Ciolos is a former European commissioner for agriculture and his
    ministers are mostly people with no political affiliations and with experience
    working in the private sector, European institutions and civil society. Ciolos
    was asked to form a new government by president Klaus Iohannis following the
    resignation of the Social Democrat prime minister Victor Ponta earlier this month
    after massive street protests. The Ciolos government was sworn in by Parliament
    on Tuesday.




    France. The French Parliament is considering expanding the state of emergency
    decreed in the wake of last Friday’s attacks to give the security forces more
    powers. On Wednesday, the French special police forces carried out large-scale
    operations in the northern Paris suburb of Saint-Denis targeting Abdelhamid
    Abaaoud, a Belgian citizen suspected of masterminding the deadly attacks in
    Paris. The information that he may have been killed in the raid has not been
    officially confirmed. Two people were killed in the operation and eight
    arrested. The Islamic State jihadist organisation, which claimed responsibility
    for the Paris attacks, has warned of more attacks in the future in the
    countries fighting the Islamic State in Syria and Iraq.




    Fire. According to the latest report by the Romanian health ministry, 45
    people are still in hospital with injuries from the fire that broke out at a
    Bucharest nightclub on the 30th of October. 12 are in serious or
    critical condition and 33 are stable. 30 others are treated in hospitals
    abroad. The lives of 56 people were cut short in the deadly fire.




    Tennis. The
    Romanian-Indian doubles pair Florin Mergea and Rohan Bopanna today face the all
    Italian pair Simone
    Bolelli and Fabio Fognini at the ATP World Tour Finals in London. Mergea and
    Bopanna have already qualified for the semifinals, having defeated the American
    pair Bob and Mike Bryan and the British-Australian pair Jamie Murray and John
    Peers. Last night, the Romanian-Dutch pair Horia Tecau and Jean Julien Rojer
    defeated the Croatian-Brazilian pair Ivan Dodig and Marcelo Melo in their
    second round-robin match to qualify for the semifinals. It is for the first
    time that Romania has two players in the ATP World Tour Finals worth 7 million
    dollars and featuring the world’s 8 best-ranked singles players and doubles
    teams.




    Book fair. The Gaudeamus International Book Fair organised by the Romanian Radio
    Broadcasting Corporation is under way in Bucharest. Held until Sunday, the fair
    brings together over 300 publishing houses and hosts 700 different events. This
    year’s guest of honour is the Group of Francophone Embassies, Delegations and
    Institutions in Romania (GADIF).

    (Translated by: C. Mateescu)

  • November 16, 2015 UPDATE

    November 16, 2015 UPDATE

    France is not engaged in a war of civilizations because those assassins don’t represent any civilization- said Monday the French President François Hollande before the joint chambers of Parliament. President Hollande has called on the French people to show unity after Friday’s attacks that killed about 130 people, among whom two Romanian citizens, and wounded 350. Previously, the prime minister Manuel Valls warned that France had to be prepared for further attacks, that could take place in other European countries as well, in the coming days and weeks. The investigations undertaken in the wake of the attacks show that a Belgian citizen of Moroccan origin is the mastermind of the terrorist attack. Investigators say the suspect, Abdulhamid Abaaoud, aged 27, is now in Syria, with the Islamic state group. Many people have been arrested and tens of firearms confiscated following searches made across France. Another operation took place in Belgium, Brussels, where explosions and gunfire could be heard in a district with a majority Muslim population.



    European countries and EU officials on Monday launched in Brussels an appeal to unity in order to fight terrorism after Friday’s attacks in Paris. Attending a meeting of the EU foreign ministers in Brussels, the EU foreign affairs chief Federica Mogherini called on Europeans to join forces in front of the terrorist threat. The European officials also talked about plans to set up, by the end of 2015, along the so-called refugee route through the Western Balkans, in Macedonia and Serbia, 50 thousand camps to temporarily accommodate the immigrants. An equal number of camps is supposed to be set up in Greece.



    The Romanian Parliament will vote on Tuesday for the new government formed by the prime minister designate Dacian Ciolos and for his governing program. A former European Commissioner for Agriculture, Ciolos formed a government team dominated by technocrats, with no political affiliation, who have experience in the private sector, the European institutions and civil society. His governing program includes the revision of investment programs and reforms in the education and healthcare systems. The designation of Dacian Ciolos by President Klaus Iohannis to form a new government follows the resignation, early this month, of the government led by Social Democrat Victor Ponta.



    The former Social-Democrat minister of finance, Darius Vâlcov, on Monday was subject to legal restrictions pending trial for 60 days, in a corruption case in which the National Anti-Corruption Directorate prosecutors accuse him of bribe taking and influence peddling. Vâlcov is supposed to have committed the illegal acts when he was mayor of Slatina (a town in the south) and also afterwards. Between 2012- 2014 he allegedly received almost 1 million euros accounting for 10-15% of the value of some public services contracts. Vâlcov is also being investigated by the anti-corruption prosecutors in another 2 cases on similar charges. Also on Monday the state secretary with the Health Ministry Alin Tucmeanu was heard by the anti-corruption prosecutors in a corruption case. According to judicial sources he is supposed to have taken bribe in exchange for granting certain contracts. In this case prosecutors have searched both the Health Ministry headquarters and the state secretary’s house.



    Another patient injured in the October 30th fire in the “Colectiv” nightclub in Bucharest died Monday in a Bucharest hospital, raising the death toll to 56. The Health Ministry announced 55 people injured in the fire are still in hospital in the capital Bucharest. 12 of them are in a critical and serious condition. Another 28 wounded are being treated in hospitals from abroad. We recall that the fire broke out during a rock concert attended by hundreds of people. The fire started from the fireworks used during the concert. Many of the people in the concert hall sustained burns but most of them died of poisoning with toxic fumes.



    The Romanian –Dutch pair Horia Tecău/ Jean-Julien Rojer on Monday won their opening match of the 2015 London ATP World Tour Finals defeating 6-2, 6-4 the pair Marcin Matkowski (Poland)/Nenad Zimonjic (Serbia). On Sunday in the other group of the tournament the duo made up of Romanian Florin Mergea and Indian Rohan Bopanna won 6-4, 6-3 the match against the American pair Bob and Mike Bryan. On Tuesday Mergea and Bopanna will play against the British-Australian pair Jamie Murray/ John Peers. The World Tour Finals, which has prizes up for grabs worth 7 million dollars, lines up the best 8 players of the 2015 season, as well as the best 8 men’s pairs in the doubles competition.



    Romania’s national football team will take on the Italian eleven on Tuesday evening, in Bologna, in an away training match. The friendly match is part of a series of matches played before the two teams’ participation in the finals of the European Championships, scheduled for the summer of 2016 in France. With 5 victories and 5 draws in 10 matches Romania’s team ended 2nd, last month, in the preliminary group F and directly qualified to the Euro 2016 alongside Northern Ireland. The group also included Hungary, Finland, the Faeroe Islands and Greece.

  • November 13, 2015

    November 13, 2015

    The President of Romania, Klaus Iohannis, emphasised the need for further efforts and better cooperation between EU member states, towards more efficient control of the Unions external borders. The statement was made in Malta, where Iohannis attended the EU – Africa summit on migration and an informal meeting of the European Council. According to a news release issued by the Presidential Administration, the informal meeting focused on the measures already decided at a European level with respect to migration, with a view to strengthening cooperation with third countries, particularly Turkey, and to improving the security of the EU foreign borders.



    The PM designate of Romania, Dacian Cioloş, has announced that by the end of the week he will make public the membership of his Cabinet. Before that, however, he will have a new round of consultations with the parliamentary parties. After the first talks, the National Liberal Party, the National Union for the Progress of Romania and the group of national minorities in Parliament announced their unconditional support for the new government. The Social Democrats, the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats and the Democratic Union of Ethnic Hungarians however are waiting to see the list of new ministers and the government programme. According to the Senate Speaker, Calin Popescu Tariceanu, a vote is scheduled for next week for the validation of the new cabinet.



    Two weeks after the tragedy that hit the Colectiv nightclub in Bucharest, the death toll is 55. More than 60 patients are still in hospitals in Bucharest, while 30 others receive care abroad. The tragedy took place during a rock concert attended by several hundred people. During the fireworks show, a support pillar caught fire, and the flames spread quickly across the ceiling. Many of the victims suffered burn injuries, but one of the causes of the large number of deaths is the inhalation of the deadly mix of toxic gases in the smoke, doctors said.



    The Romanian Foreign Ministry strongly condemned the double suicide attack in Beirut that killed more than 40 people on Thursday. The Foreign Ministry reiterated its support for the peace, stability and unity of Lebanon, as well as the importance of carrying on the joint efforts to fight terrorism. The attack was claimed by the IS group. According to the BBC, it is the deadliest attack since the end of the civil war in that country. The two bombings took place in the south of the Lebanese capital city, where the attackers detonated their explosive vests in busy areas as believers were coming out of mosques. This was the first attack in the last 12 months to target a Hezbollah stronghold in Lebanon, in a period when the group, backed by Iran, strengthened its involvement in the war in neighbouring Syria.



    Romanias GDP rose by 1.4% in the third quarter compared to the previous three months, and by 3.6% compared to the third quarter of last year, according to data released today by the National Statistics Institute. The Romanian economy grew by 3.7% in the first 9 months of the year, since 2014. Early this month, the European Commission upgraded its estimates regarding Romanias economic growth rate in 2015 to 3.5%, as opposed to the 2.8% estimated in May. According to the EC, Romanias GDP is expected to increase by 4.1% in 2016 and 3.6% in 2017, thanks to an increase in consumption prompted by fiscal relaxation measures.



    The ATP World Tour Finals begins on Sunday in London, with the 2015 seasons top 8 players and 8 top teams in the doubles taking part. For the first time, two Romanian players take part in the doubles competition. Horia Tecău will play together with the Dutch Jean-Julien Rojer, and Florin Mergea with Indias Rohan Bopanna. Tecău and Rojer play in Group B, against Seed No. 3 Ivan Dodig/Marcelo Melo, No. 6 Pierre-Hugues Herbert/Nicolas Mahut and No. 7 Marcin Matkowski/Nenad Zimonjici. Mergea and Bopanna play in Group A, and will be facing Mike Bryan/Bob Bryan (USA), Jamie Murray/John Peers (UK/Australia) and Simone Bolelli/Fabio Fognini (Italy). World leader Novak Djokovic is also the No 1 seed in the tournament which has 7 million USD in prize money.


    (translation by Ana-Maria Popescu)