Radio România Internațional

Tag: freight

  • September 3, 2024

    September 3, 2024

     

    PARLIAMENT The Parliament of Romania has convened for the last session in its current term, given that general elections are due to take place on December 1, the National Day of Romania. One of the priorities is a bill raising the pension tax threshold to EUR 600. The bill is being reviewed and voted on today in the Chamber of Deputies, and is to take effect on October 1. Meanwhile, the Senate voted on a bill under which Romania will donate a PATRIOT missile system to neighbouring Ukraine. The bill was also endorsed by the lower Chamber under an emergency procedure.

     

    GRANTS The Romanian foreign ministry (MAE) announced the results of the selection of non-EU students to receive grants from the Romanian government this academic year. A record-high number of applications have been received (81,914, from 160 countries on 5 continents), which according to a news release reflects the growing interest of students in the educational opportunities provided by Romanian universities. The applications have been submitted online, at www.studyinromania.gov.ro, between January 16 and March 16, 2024. Selection criteria included academic excellence, geographic diversity and gender equality, as well as Romania’s foreign policy interests in relation to the applicants’ home countries. The 500 grant beneficiaries will go to prestigious university centres in the country (Braşov, Bucharest, Cluj-Napoca, Constanţa, Craiova, Iaşi, Sibiu, Timişoara and others) and will study a variety of fields, such as international relations, engineering, law, computer sciences, performing arts, economy, business or education sciences.

     

    CYBERATTACK Personal data stolen in a cyber-attack targeting the Timişoara City Hall, local police and tax agency have been put up for sale by hackers on a Telegram channel. The discovery was made by the founder of a consulting platform for corporate victims of cyber-attacks. The Mayor of Timişoara, Dominic Fritz, has neither confirmed or denied the personal data theft, and said he was waiting for the relevant authorities to investigate the matter. After the attack that took place 10 days ago, the City Hall announced that the institution took counter-measures and managed to prevent the entire system from being compromised. The institution also said at that point that there were no indications that personal data had been extracted. Online tax payments were subsequently discontinued.

     

    FACILITIES The Romanian government would collect nearly EUR 2 bln if at least 15% of the taxpayers with debts to the authorities accessed a facility that extinguishes penalties, under a draft emergency order posted by the finance ministry. The bill exempts debtors from the payment of interest and penalties provided that they pay their back taxes by November 25. For individuals with debts up to EUR 1,000, half of the overdue amount may be written off, if the remaining 50% is paid. According to the ministry, the total debts to the state budget at the end of June reached around 10% of the country’s GDP. Debts to local authorities amounted to nearly RON 22 bln, debts to the social security funds to RON 4 bln, and debts to the public health insurance funds were close to RON 8 bln.

     

    AUTOMOTIVE The number of new cars registered in Romania in the first 8 months of the year was 106,534, up 6.35% compared to the corresponding period of 2023, according to the Vehicle Registration and Driving License Directorate quoted by the Romanian Carmakers Association (ACAROM). Broken down by car make, the largest number of new registrations was reported by Dacia (more than 32,000), followed by Toyota (9,206), Hyundai (6,961), Skoda (6,938), Renault (6,873), Volkswagen (6,352), Ford (4,503), Mercedes (3,689), BMW (3,420) and Suzuki (3,301).

     

    TRANSPORT Air freight transport increased in Romania in the first half of 2024 by 7.4%, compared to the corresponding period of last year, more specifically from 24,400 tonnes to 26,200 tonnes, according to data made public by the National Statistics Institute. For both domestic and international shipments, the largest cargo quantities were registered on Bucharest’s Henri Coandă Airport, followed by Avram Iancu Airport in Cluj-Napoca (north-west), and Traian Vuia Airport in Timişoara (west).

     

    TENNIS The Romanian tennis players Irina Begu and Anca Todoni have qualified in the 8th-finals of the WTA 125 tournament in Montreux (Switzerland). Irina Begu (34 yo, no. 130 WTA) only needed 68 minutes to beat the 19-year old Swiss player Celine Naef (177 WTA), 6-0, 6-3. Anca Todoni (aged 19, no. 136 WTA) won 6-2, 6-4 against Maja Chwalińska of Poland (172 WTA), in a 1.5-hour match. The two Romanian players won USD 2,000 each and 15 WTA points. In the 8th-finals, Begu takes on Laura Pigossi of Brazil (141 WTA), and Todoni plays the winner of the match pitting seed no. 1 Maria Lourdes Carle (Argentina) against Victoria Jimenez Kasintseva (Andorra). Miriam Bulgaru is also to play against Italy’s Camilla Rosatello in the main draw of the tournament. (AMP)

  • May 21, 2023 UPDATE

    May 21, 2023 UPDATE

    EDUCATION On Monday the staff in Romania’s public undergraduate
    education will go on strike, the trade unions in the sector announced after
    Sunday’s talks with government officials. The protest will continue until
    unions have received a credible solution from the government, the leader of
    the Spiru Haret Trade Union Federation, Marius Nistor, said. The government put
    forth a clear roadmap for the endorsement of the new salary law and promised pay
    raises for non-teaching staff, which according to unionists would only amount
    to EUR 20 a month. Financial incentives for entry-level teachers and experienced
    staff teaching in underprivileged areas have also been proposed. The higher
    education staff will also go on token strikes as of Monday, the head of the Alma
    Mater National Trade Union Federation Anton Hadăr announced. Trade unions said
    negotiations would continue in the coming days.


    MOLDOVA
    A large-scale rally was held in Chişinău on Sunday, at the initiative of
    president Maia Sandu, in order to prove Moldovans’ support for the country’s EU
    accession. Europe is the Republic of Moldova. The Republic of Moldova is
    Europe. Moldova is not alone, the president of the European Parliament, Roberta
    Metsola said in Romanian at the European Moldova National Assembly. Participants
    adopted a resolution confirming the support of Moldovan citizens for the
    country’s EU accession efforts. The rally takes place as the Republic of
    Moldova, an EU accession candidate country, would like to begin accession
    negotiations by the end of this year. For this stage to begin, Moldova must
    complete 9 recommendations, which will be assessed by this autumn in a European
    Commission report. In Bucharest, the Organisation of Moldovan Students
    organised a similar rally in front of Moldova’s Embassy. Scores of people
    watched the speeches in Chisinau jointly with the Moldovan Ambassador to
    Bucharest, Victor Chirila.


    DIPLOMACY The Romanian foreign minister Bogdan Aurescu takes part on
    Monday in the meeting of the EU Foreign Affairs Council in Brussels. The EU
    foreign ministers will discuss measures to mitigate the effects of Russia’s
    aggression in Ukraine and the situation in the Horn of Africa. The EU officials
    will also touch on the bloc’s commitment in Central Asia, developments in Tunisia,
    the relations between Armenia and Azerbaijan in the context of high-level EU
    diplomatic contacts with both countries. According to the Romanian foreign
    ministry, Bogdan Aurescu will reiterate Romania’s firm, multidimensional and
    continuing support for Ukraine and will express hopes that an agreement will be
    reached as soon as possible on the 8th support package for the
    Ukrainian air forces under the EU Peace Facility. Minister Aurescu will also
    highlight the importance of keeping pressure on Russia by consolidating
    sanctions, and will reiterate the idea of setting up a special international tribunal
    for the crime of aggression to prosecute Russian crimes of aggression during
    the war in Ukraine.


    RAILWAYS The president of Romania’s Competition Council, Bogdan
    Chiriţoiu, made statements concerning Carpatica Feroviar, a new company that
    will take over the operations of the state-owned railway freight corporation CFR
    Marfă. The new company will take over the profitable contracts and the
    equipment needed for completing them, while the other assets will be sold in order
    to cover as much as possible of the old company’s debts to the state budget
    Chiriţoiu explained. He emphasised that current operations will not be
    discontinued. The financial performance of CFR Marfă improved slightly in 2022,
    but the company still owes some EUR 400 mln to the state budget and social
    security budget.


    BEEKEEPERS Romanian beekeepers say they are left with large amounts
    of unsold honey because of imports of cheaper and poorer-quality honey. The
    head of the Romanian Beekeepers Association, Ioan Fetea, says the situation is
    particularly serious as last year’s yield was a lot smaller than in previous
    years. Last year beekeepers saw modest yields, but they could not even sell those,
    precisely because of these dumping practices, obviously explained by the fact
    that that honey is not in line with EU regulations. Almost half of the honey
    imported into Europe is adulterated, counterfeit, and obviously sold very
    cheaply, which puts tremendous pressure on local producers, Fetea explained. Beekeepers
    are also struggling with a fall in the number of bee families, because of the
    use of insecticides in agriculture.


    UKRAINE The US president Joe Biden Sunday announced new military aid
    measures for Ukraine, following talks with his Ukrainian counterpart Volodymyr Zelenskyy,
    on the sidelines of the G7 summit in Hiroshima. The new aid package will
    consist of ammunitions, artillery and armoured vehicles, Joe Biden explained, just
    days after approving the provision of F-16 fighter jets to Ukraine. According
    to Reuters, this new package is worth up to USD 375 mln and is designed to
    strengthen Ukraine’s defence in the war against Russia. The British PM Rishi
    Sunak also announced in Hiroshima that his country would start training
    Ukrainian pilots this summer, to support Ukraine’s air forces in the conflict.
    Rishi Sunak added that no one wants peace more than Volodymyr Zelenskyy, but
    the terms for peace, he added, should be based on Ukraine’s principles. In the
    3-day summit in Japan, the G7 nations voiced their willingness to stand by
    Ukraine in the long run.



    ROWING Romania won 2 gold and 3 silver medals at
    the 2023 European Rowing Under 19 Championships in Brive-la-Gaillarde, France,
    in which it took part with 11 boats. Romania came out second in the overall nations
    tables, behind Italy and ahead of Turkey. In last year’s competition, Romania
    had won 5 medals (3 gold, one silver and one bronze), and finished top of the
    ranking by nations. (AMP)

  • June 18, 2021 UPDATE

    June 18, 2021 UPDATE

    COVID-19 On Friday 70 new cases of coronavirus infection were reported in Romania, out of over 32,000 tests performed. Also, 6 deaths were reported. The number of patients in intensive care has dropped below 200. The head of the vaccination campaign in Romania, Valeriu Gheorghita, has announced that vaccination coverage at national level stands at 25% of the eligible population. 29,000 doses of vaccine have been administered in the past 24 hours, accounting for less than one-third of the number reported during peak vaccination periods. Since the start of the national vaccine roll-out, on December 27, more than 4.6 million people have been immunised in Romania, of whom 4.3 million with both doses. According to a survey by the Research Institute for Quality of Life, even if most Romanians are aware of the threat posed by the coronavirus, some 2 million are against vaccination, and 800,000 say the pandemic is not real.



    PROTEST Romanian freight carriers Friday deliberately hampered traffic on the main roads in the country. The protest came after the Transport Ministry announced that it will change the way the road fee, known as the vignette, is going to be calculated from now on, namely per kilometer and depending on pollution standards, rather than on duration, as it is now. Transport companies are also unhappy with the inspections conducted by the tax authorities, which plan to levy taxes on drivers daily allowances when traveling abroad.



    COMMEMORATION On Friday, for the first time, Romania commemorated the Day of Communist Regime Deportation Victims. Deportation under the Romanian communist regime was inspired by the Soviet gulag model. Such actions started in 1944, and targeted ethnic Germans accused of collaboration with the Nazi authorities. That was followed by the relocation of the families of land owners, factories or other commercial enterprises. The peasants who opposed collectivisation were also deported. The most tragic episode in this respect took place on June 18, 1951, when about 44,000 people on a 25 km strip on the border with Yugoslavia were deported to Bărăgan (south), in one of the most secret, quick and repressive actions ever organised by the communist authorities. After 1955, former political detainees released from prisons were sent to various localities, most of them in the Bărăgan villages already built as a result of the 1951 deportation. In 1967, the deportation of Romanian citizens was declared illegal even by the communist authorities.



    DEFICIT The European Council Friday adopted the recommendation under the excessive deficit procedure for Romania. The recommendation establishes that Romania should put an end to the excessive deficit situation by 2024 at the latest. The procedure was launched in April 2020, after Romania exceeded the 3% budget deficit ceiling in 2019. The Council said that an extension to the current deadline for Romania to correct its public deficit would be important in order not to compromise the economic recovery after the COVID-19 pandemic. The recommendation also says that, in order to meet the new deadline, Romania would need to achieve a general government deficit target of 8.0% of GDP in 2021, 6.2% of GDP in 2022, 4.4% of GDP in 2023, and 2.9% of GDP in 2024, which is in line with the Romanian governments objectives.



    UN The UN General Assembly Friday appointed the Portuguese António Guterres to a second 5-year term as secretary general. Guterres, 72, had been endorsed on June 8 by the UN Security Council, the most difficult stage of the selection of a new secretary general, in that it requires the consensus of the worlds major powers. The former Portuguese Socialist PM had no challengers and will begin his second term on January 1, 2022. Prior to this position with the UN, Antonio Guterres served as UN High Commissioner for Refugees for a 10-year period.



    TENNIS Horia Tecău (Romania) / Kevin Krawietz (Germany) qualified into the doubles final of the tennis tournament in Halle (Germany), ATP 500, after defeating the Belgians Sander Gille / Joran Vliegen, 7-6, 7-5. Tecău and Krawietz are playing their 3rd final this season, after having lost the ones in Rotterdam and Barcelona. (tr. A.M. Popescu)

  • August 23, 2016 UPDATE

    August 23, 2016 UPDATE

    CORRUPTION Anti-corruption prosecutors in Romania have decided a 30- day preventive detention for the vice-president of the National Agency for Medicines and Medical Devices, Lazar Iordache, who has been charged with bribery and influence peddling. According to the Anti-corruption Directorate in April and June this year, Lazar Iordache promised a high Health Ministry official 5% of the money allotted for two hospitals. On April 28th Iordache allegedly gave the official about 28 thousand euros so that he may intervene with other officials in the ministry for the money to be disbursed. The money pledged and given by Iordache was part of the funds the ministry allotted for the two hospitals, including for building a water treatment facility.




    EXPLOSION A team of experts is investigating the circumstances of the explosion that killed a man wounding three others at the Navodari refinery in southeastern Romania. Two nitrogen tanks and a gas pump went off at the refinery causing a blaze. The authorities intervened promptly, rescued the personnel and put out the fire. According to experts, there are no gas emissions dangerous to people in the region.




    TALKS German Chancellor Angela Merkel, French President Francois Hollande and Italian PM Matteo Renzi discussed on Monday on board an Italian aircraft carrier about the impact of Britain’s decision to leave the bloc. Angela Merkel has said that the EU has to prove that it is able to prosper without Britain. She recalled that the EU had been born from some of the “darkest moments” of European history but added that in the face of “enormous challenges” it must now work together, strengthening internal and external borders, boosting economic growth and providing jobs for its young people. “We respect the choice made by the citizens of Britain but we want to write a future chapter“, Italian PM Matteo Renzi has said in his turn. ‘Europe after Brexit will relaunch the powerful ideals of unity and peace, freedom and dreams’, the Italian official has also said. The meeting in Italy was held three weeks ahead of the EU summit in Bratislava, which is seen as crucial for the future of the Union.




    PROTEST Romanian road freight and passenger carriers have announced they will run at low speed at least one hour per day on the main roads across the country. They are discontented mainly because car insurance premiums have doubled from 2,000 to more than 4,000 Euros within a year. Consequently, road carriers in Romania report high costs, adding they can no longer be competitive at a European level. The line associations call on the government to freeze car insurance premiums and have warned that if measures are not taken urgently, they might call an all-out strike on September 15th. Also, animal breeders took to the streets and continue to protest in front of the Government headquarters. They say they will give up protests only when they receive subsides for 2015 in their entirety.