Radio România Internațional

Tag: Diana Sosoaca

  • March 14, 2025

    March 14, 2025

    FAIR Over March 13-16 the Belgian capital is hosting the international book fair Brussels Book Fair 2025, one of the most important events of this kind in Europe. Romania is attending this fair with over five hundred titles on view at the stand of the Romanian Cultural Institute also known as ICR. There are books and albums translated in several languages, predominantly in French, some of which have been funded through the ICR programmes with a view to promoting the Romanian authors at international level. Besides Romanian authors, the ICR stand is also promoting authors from the Republic of Moldova, an ex-soviet Romanian-speaking country. The ICR is expected to stage several events, during which authors are going to have a dialogue with foreign authors or with the Belgian readership. The Brussels Book Fair is one of the most important cultural events in the Belgian capital, which is also the EU capital, and brings together several thousand authors, illustrators, publishers, critics as well as readers annually.

     

    EBRD The president of the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development EBRD, Odile Renaud-Basso, will be visiting Bulgaria and Romania next week, the aforementioned financial institution has announced in a communiqué. The visit of the EBRD president comes at a time when the institution is preparing fresh five-year strategies for both countries, which will be subjected for public consultations at the end of this year. The EBRD investment in Romania rose from 658 million Euros up to 707 million last year. The EBRD official will be seeing Prime Minister Marcel Ciolacu, Finance Minister, Tanczos Barna, Energy Minister, Sebastian Burduja, as well as representatives of the business environment, diplomats and representatives of civil society.

     

    ELECTION Candidates for the presidential election in May have two more days to register with the Central Election Bureau, the deadline being March 15 at midnight. So far, only two candidates are officially enrolled in the race, their candidacies having been validated by the Constitutional Court: Crin Antonescu, supported by the PSD-PNL-UDMR ruling coalition, and the Bucharest Mayor General, Nicuşor Dan, who runs as an independent candidate. Deputy Victor Ponta also registered his candidacy as an independent candidate, for which he was excluded from the Social-Democratic Party. On the other hand, the Constitutional Court’s decision to definitively reject the candidacy of independent candidate Călin Georgescu, a pro-Russian extremist who unexpectedly won the first round of last year’s presidential election, has prompted the parties that supported him, AUR and POT, to prepare a new electoral strategy. Thus, the leaders of the two parties, George Simion and Ana-Maria Gavrilă, announced they would both submit their candidacies for the presidential election, and one of them will withdraw once their candidacies are validated. The leader of USR, Elena Lasconi, who advanced to the second round last year, Diana Şoşoacă (from SOS Romania), who expressed confidence her candidacy would be upheld this time, as well as and MEP Cristian Terheş from the Romanian National Conservative Party, also submitted their candidacies.

     

    TRADE DEFICIT – Romania’s trade deficit increased by 38% in January, compared to the same period last year, the National Statistics Institute reports. In 2024, Romania exported goods worth €92.6 billion, while its imports stood at €133.4 billion. Romania’s deficit remains significant, especially in relations with China, Germany and Poland, while recording surpluses with the UK, the Republic of Moldova and the USA, although in smaller volumes. Trade in agricultural products and foodstuffs remains vulnerable, as Romania mainly exports raw materials and imports end products. To reduce the €5 billion trade deficit in this area, experts recommend a strategy focused on the export of value-added products and more efficient use of statistical data for better-founded economic decisions.

    (bill)

  • Who is running for Romania’s presidency?

    Who is running for Romania’s presidency?

    The presidential election is now in a straight line. The most awaited election of all four organized this year in Romania will take place in two rounds: on November 24 and December 8. The Central Electoral Bureau (BEC), meeting on Sunday evening to analyze the last files submitted, rejected 10 candidacies and admitted the registration of another 9. Thus, in total, there are 16 admitted candidates in the race for Romania’s presidency. The final list of competitors will be announced on October 10, after other mandatory documents will be submitted, such as the affidavits regarding their status of workers or collaborators of the Securitate (Political Police of the former Communist regime), as well as the declarations of wealth and interests. The electoral campaign for the presidential election officially begins on October 25 and is about to be a fierce one, given the political stakes of the election.

     

    Unofficially, however, the campaign has already started for weeks, with each of the most famous aspirants to the presidential seat trying to maximize their pole position in the race. These are, in the order of submission of candidacies to the BEC, George Simion, from the Alliance for the Union of Romanians (AUR), Elena Lasconi representing the Save Romania Union (USR) and Nicolae Ciucă, the leader of the National Liberal Party, followed by Kelemen Hunor, from the Democratic Union of Ethnic Hungarians in Romania, Mircea Geoană, an independent candidate and Marcel Ciolacu, the leader of the Social Democratic Party. A huge scandal broke out on Saturday evening, after the judges of the Constitutional Court (CCR) admitted, with a majority of votes, the objections to the registration of Diana Şoşoacă’s candidacy in the presidential race. The controversial MEP submitted a new candidacy file, but it was also rejected on Sunday, this time by the Central Electoral Bureau. The Constitutional Court’s decision to remove the S.O.S. president from the electoral race is final and unprecedented.

     

    Romania has deepened the differences between the Social Democratic Party (PSD) and the National Liberal Party (PNL), which are currently partners in the government. Diana Şoşoacă accused that her removal from the race would favor the AUR leader, George Simion, who would thus have better chances to enter the second round, and the social democrat Marcel Ciolacu, credited by the polls with the first chance, would have an easier fight against his opponent in the final round of the presidential election. The opinion was shared by PNL and USR, whose leaders – Nicolae Ciucă and Elena Lasconi – believe that PSD would have influenced the rejection of Mrs. Șoșoacă’s candidacy. The PSD rejected the accusations, and Marcel Ciolacu emphasized that the CCR must quickly publish their motivation, otherwise we can talk about a vulnerability of the democratic system in Romania. The Court’s decision may have constitutional coverage, but it certainly has anti-democratic effects, unhealthy for democracy, the independent Mircea Geoană also reacted. (LS)

  • Ursula von der Leyen, re-elected

    Ursula von der Leyen, re-elected

    The President of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen, has been confirmed at the helm of the European Commission for the next 5 years, after she was voted, on Thursday’s first session of the new European Parliament since the June election. The support for von der Leyen was even greater compared to her first term, although right-wing and left-wing opposition forces have consolidated their presence in the community bloc. Her candidacy was dealt a major blow, analysts say, after an EU Court of Justice ruled, a day before the election, that Ursula von der Leyen had not been transparent enough with the public about pandemic contracts for the purchase of Covid-19 vaccines. However, everything turned out well at the end of intense negotiations that took place until the very morning of the voting day, according to some political sources. Ursula von der Leyen received 401 votes although she needed half plus one of the total of 720. In her speech in Parliament, Ursula von der Leyen pleaded for a strong Europe and promised to make industry and defense her priorities. The president of the European Commission reconfirmed the continuation of support for Ukraine in all forms and condemned the actions of Hungarian Prime Minister Viktor Orbán that could have weakened the Union, after his recent visit to Moscow, in the context in which Hungary holds the EU Council presidency.

     

     

     

    According to the EPP, Ursula von der Leyen’s party of origin, the pro-European, pro-Ukraine and pro-rule of law majority in the European Parliament reflects the reality of European society. Ursula von der Leyen’s agenda targets both right-wing and left-wing policies, managing to respond to most of the citizens’ requests. The Social Democrats, the second largest group in Parliament, supported von der Leyen after her program included social and agricultural policies. Renew, the third-largest group in the coalition, gave von the Leyen less votes than before. Romanian MEPs however voted to support Ursula von der Leyen’s second term in office. Although they are not part of the coalition, part of the Greens voted in favor of Ursula von der Leyen. Just in like with the Social-Democrats, the Greens were promised the Commission would focus on environmental policies and the plan for affordable housing. The vote and hearings on EU Commissioners are scheduled to follow. Governments of EU Members will each have to present two candidates (one woman and one man) for the positions of European commissioners, von der Leyen said. The final vote on the structure of the Commission could be slated for September.

     

     

     

    The only incident of first day was the aggressive intervention of Romanian MEP Diana Şoşoacă, who was twice expelled from the hall for interrupting the session. The incident was criticized by all parliamentary groups, including the radical or extremist ones, and condemned by the Romanian MEPs because it mars the image of Romania at international level. Listed as a pro-Russian politician and leader of the populist SOS Romania party, the former Senator returned to her antics in the Romanian Parliament. In Brussels, however, failure to observe the rules is subject to immediate sanctions. (VP)