COMMEMORATION On Monday, when Romania commemorated 32
years since the miners’ raid on Bucharest, over June 13th and 15th,
the country’s Prime Minister Nicolae Ciuca conveyed a message saying that the
civil society’s marathon-demonstration against neo-communism was stifled by
instigating Romanians against Romanians. The Romanian society must never become
victim to diversions and false propaganda, the head of the Romanian government
says. 32 years ago responding to a call from the then authorities, miners from
the Jiu Valley in central-western Romania brutally intervened against the
peaceful anti-government protesters in downtown Bucharest. Four people were
shot dead and over 1,000 wounded along with a series of abusive arrests. The
file on the miners’ raid, under which the country’s then President Ion Iliescu,
former Prime Minister Petre Roman and Virgil Magureanu, the former head of the
country’s intelligence service, had been sent to court must be resumed from
scratch after the indictment was considered null and void.
MEETING Romanian president Klaus Iohannis will be attending a
low-scale meeting aimed at preparing the upcoming NATO summit. The meeting is
being staged by the Dutch and Danish Prime Ministers and will be attended by
the Prime Ministers of Belgium, Latvia, Poland and Portugal as well as by NATO
Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg. Participants will be focusing on
coordinating the positions and joint messages of the allied countries ahead of
the NATO summit in Madrid late this month. Talks are expected to focus on the
situation in Ukraine, the consolidation of the deterrence & defence posture
on NATO’s eastern flank, the alliance’s new strategic concept and the accession
prospects of Sweden and Finland.
MONKEYPOX Romania announced its first case of monkeypox on Monday, a
26 year old man in Bucharest. Monkeypox cannot be spread easily among humans and
needs close body contact. The rash, bodily fluids (such as fluid, pus or
blood from skin lesions) and scabs are particularly infectious. The main way in
which one can get the disease is through long physical contact with an infected
person.
WAR Amnesty
International has accused Russia of war crimes in Ukraine, claiming that
hundreds of civilians have been killed in merciless frag bomb attacks against
the city of Kharkiv, AFP reports. After thorough investigations, this human
rights NGO claims it found evidence that the Russian forces had used widely-banned cluster ammunition. People
have been killed in their homes and in the streets, in playgrounds and in
cemeteries, while queueing for humanitarian aid, or shopping for food and
medicine, says an Amnesty International’s Senior Crisis Response Advisor.
While Russia is not a party to either the Convention on Cluster Munitions or the Convention
on Anti-Personnel Mines, international
humanitarian law prohibits indiscriminate attacks, and the use of weapons that
are indiscriminate by nature.
REFUGEES Roughly
7,000 Ukrainian citizens entered Romania through its border checkpoints on
Sunday, June 12th, 26% less than in the previous day, the Border Police General
Inspectorate has announced. Since the onset of the conflict in Ukraine, roughly
1.2 million Ukrainian citizens have entered Romania.
COVID-19 Romania is no longer providing COVID-19 infection reports
on a daily basis, but weekly. According to Health Minister Alexandru Rafila,
the reports will be just like in the case of season flu, as the spreading
degree of the virus is very low at present and on a downward trend. The number
of people in need of hospital treatment is also going down. The health minister
said that authorities won’t go back to daily monitoring unless the situation
worsens. Last week, Romania reported 2,112 new infections with 51 patients in
ICUs. 21 related fatalities have also been reported for the period between June
6 and 12.
TENNIS Romanian tennis player Simona
Halep on Monday secured a 6-1, 6-4 win against Lesia Tsurenko of Ukraine in the
first round of the WTA 250 Birmingham tournament. Another Romanian in the
competition, sixth-seeded Sorana Cirstea will be playing US challenger Shelby
Rogers on Tuesday.
(bill)