Radio România Internațional

Tag: future

  • The Republic of Moldova to stage a referendum on Europe

    The Republic of Moldova to stage a referendum on Europe


    Maia Sandu, the incumbent President of the ex-Soviet, Romanian-speaking Republic of Moldova, says she wants to run again for president in 2024 and has pledged to accomplish the mission of the countrys European integration.


    After she had come to office in 2020, she called on Parliament to stage a referendum for the countrys EU accession. “In three years of my mandate we managed together with the citizens to keep peace in our country, strengthen the countrys independence, to have a government and kicked off negotiations for the Republics EU accession. Our future is in the European family and it is necessary that we tell the whole country what way we choose for the Republic of Moldova. I have called on Parliament to stage a referendum next autumn, in which the citizens vote will be decisive” – Sandu went on to say. Of course Chişinău will have to take more major steps in its European integration process, the Moldovan official added, giving assurances that she is ready to carry on this process. This would be Sandus third candidature. After she had lost the presidential seat to her pro-Russian opponent, Igor Dodon in 2016, she took revenge with a landslide victory four years later. We recall that in 2020, the leader of the pro-Western Action and Solidarity Party, a.k.a PAS, became president of the Republic of Moldova. A year later, this political force managed to get Parliament majority and step up its policy of coming closer to the EU and the USA. In 2022 the Republic of Moldova got the statute of EU accession candidate jointly with Ukraine. In 2023, the European leaders decided the republic should commence its accession negotiations in December with a new European Commission assessment scheduled for March 2024.


    During the Russian-Ukrainian war, Chişinău started talking about the Russian threat and cutting its ties with the Commonwealth of Independent States. In May, President Sandu accused Russia of having tried to overthrow the authorities in Chisinau. In the meantime, the opposition, including the Socialist Party of the former country president Dodon, believes the incumbent leadership is actually receiving orders from the western curators. The Republic of Moldova proclaimed its independence from the Soviet Union in 1991 and Romania was the first state to recognize its independence. A year later, the breakaway region of Transdniester located between the Dniester and Ukraine de facto rejected Chisinaus authority following an armed conflict with hundreds of dead, which ended after the Russian troops had joined the separatists. Russian troops are still present in Transdniester, which is functioning almost as an independent region with a territory of 41 hundred square kilometers inhabited by half a million pro-Russians. The region has its own currency, passports and car registration plates, even if its not recognized by the international community.


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  • October 22, 2018

    October 22, 2018

    STRASBOURG President of Romania Klaus Iohannis will take part on Tuesday in Strasbourg in a debate organised by the European Parliament with respect to the future of the European Union. The head of state will present Romanias views on the topic. It is for the first time that the President of Romania will address the European Parliament, and his participation in the event takes place in the context of a series of debates on the future of the European bloc, in which the leaders of the EU member states are invited to take part. In the plenary session that begins on Tuesday, the MEPs will also discuss the 2019 budget of the Union, ways to reduce the impact of certain plastic products on the environment, and the taxes to be charged for the use of certain infrastructure segments by heavy duty vehicles.




    SECURITY The European Commissioner for Security Union Julian King is on an official visit to Bucharest today. He will discuss with the Interior Minister Carmen Dan topics related to the security of EU citizens, including ways to identify efficient European legislation to fight online radicalisation. Julian King will also have meetings with the head of the Romanian Intelligence Service Eduard Hellvig, with the presidential adviser for national security and with Justice Ministry officials.




    LAW The Parliament of Romania is re-examining the Offshore Bill, after the ruling coalition made up of the Social Democratic Party and the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats reached an agreement last week. In early August, President Klaus Johannis did not sign the bill into law and sent it back to Parliament for a review. What is at stake is, first and foremost, the profit that Romania will make from natural gas extraction in the Black Sea. The Energy Minister, Anton Anton, is expected to attend in the Chamber of Deputies today a debate on the Offshore Bill and the solutions for capitalising on the natural gas in the Black Sea. The Deputies in the specialised committees are to decide on the final text of the bill to be subject to the vote in a plenary sitting.




    PROTESTS Several hundreds of people Sunday night took part in a new anti-government protest. The participants voiced their discontent with a recent ruling of the High Court of Cassation and Justice, which bans unplanned protests, and with an emergency order issued by the Government concerning changes of regulations in the judiciary. In Cluj Napoca, in the north-west, around 100 people also gathered further to an appeal on social media, to protest the Governments policies in the judiciary.





    TREATY The US national security adviser John Bolton has arrived in Moscow today, where he will be received by the Russian President Vladimir Putin. The latter will request clarifications regarding the USAs plan to pull out of the Intermediate-Range Nuclear Forces treaty (INF). The US President Donald Trump announced a few days ago that Washington would withdraw from the INF. The US unilateral withdrawal from the treaty signed with Russia during the Cold War is a mistake, China warned on Monday. The spokesman for the Chinese Foreign Ministry Hua Chunyiong said Beijing is against this plan. The INF treaty was signed in 1987 by the US President Ronald Reagan and the Soviet leader Mikhail Gorbachev. The document bans the use of missiles with ranges between 500 and 5,000 km, ending the crisis started in the 1980s by the Soviet deployment of SS-20 nuclear missiles targeting all western capitals. Analysts say the withdrawal could have major implications with respect to the American defence policy in Asia, giving the Pentagon new conventional options to reinstate military balance in the region, where China has invested massively in conventional missiles.




    INVICTUS Romanian troops won the first medal in the 2018 Invictus Palarympics in Sydney, Australia, in the indoor rowing event. In the 4-minute endurance event Dumitru Paraschiva won the 3rd place, and his colleague Ciprian Iriciuc, the 4th place out of 21 competitors. At the Paralympic Games held in October 20-27, Romania is represented by 15 soldiers wounded in theatres of war. Romanian athletes, who take part in the competition for the second time, compete in the archery, cycling, Paralympic athletics, rowing, swimming, and volleyball events.




    HANDBALL The Romanian womens handball team SCM Râmnicu Vâlcea Sunday qualified into the 3rd round of the EHF Cup, after being defeated by the Turkish side Kastamonu Belediyesi, 21-20, in the return leg of the 2nd round. Another Romanian team, Măgura Cisnădie, has also qualified into this stage of the EHF Cup, after winning the 2 legs of the 2nd round against the Czech team Slavia Prague (28-25 and 29-20). SCM Craiova also enters the competition in the 3rd round, after having lost the qualifiers into the Champions League and continues into the EHF Cup. Meanwhile, HC Zalău was defeated away from home by the German team Borussia Dortmund, 24-20, and failed to qualify into the 3rd round of the EHF Cup.



    (translated by: Ana-Maria Popescu)

  • Romanians and the Latest Eurobarometer

    Romanians and the Latest Eurobarometer

    The terrorist attacks that did not strike their own countries, but hit Western EU members like France and Belgium, the migration issue or Britains imminent exit from the Union were unable to weaken Romanians confidence in the European Union. The confidence rate remains above the 36% European average, at 52%, although it has declined significantly since accession in 2007, when it stood at 65%.



    Romanians continue to foster more optimistic views on the future of Europe, even if in this respect as well the latest Eurobarometer reports a slight decline. At the end of 2016, 55% of the Romanians were in favour of the European single currency as a symbol of the European Economic and Monetary Union, while 62% of the Romanians appreciate the single digital market and its economic importance.



    On the other hand, although 58% of the citizens of Romania are satisfied with how democracy works in the EU, which is a higher rate than in the other member states, only one-third of them are happy with the quality of democracy in their own country. The Eurobarometer also reveals that support for EU priorities remains high in Romania, standing at 55% with respect to the Economic and Monetary Union and 77% with respect to the free movement of people, that is, the right to live, work or study in any member state. Two out of three Romanians believe the voice of the EU matters in the world and are in favour of a common foreign policy.



    The values that best represent the EU, Romanians answered, are human rights, democracy and peace. They also believe geography is the best element of the sense of unity among European citizens, followed by the respect for the rule of law and the solidarity with poorer regions.



    According to the Eurobarometer, for better or worse Romanians are still among the supporters of the European project, with all its ever more frequent crises and the serious challenges that Europe has to respond to. For the time being, Romania is far from the grip of populist trends, of Euro scepticism or Europhobia. But things may change, should the country find itself the victim of questionable scenarios such as a multi-speed Europe, severely criticised in Bucharest. Brexit and the centrifugal tendencies displayed by older and bigger member states call for an urgent debate on the future of the European Union. However, possible rushed decisions leading to the marginalisation of some member countries risk deepening the distrust of all citizens, Romanians included, in the fate of the European Union.