Radio România Internațional

Tag: Pope

  • March 25, 2019 UPDATE

    March 25, 2019 UPDATE

    VISIT King Abdullah ll of Jordan has cancelled his three-day visit to
    Romania, which was supposed to start on Monday after Romanian Prime Minister
    Viorica Dancila announced Bucharest’s intention to move its embassy from Tel
    Aviv to Jerusalem. The head of the Romanian state Klaus Iohannis has said the
    move will take place only after the completion of a study, which is presently
    underway and hasn’t been submitted to the Romanian presidency yet. A final
    decision on this matter belongs to the Romanian president, who, under the
    Constitution, is entitled to any foreign policy decision, being also Romania’s
    representative at international level, says a communiqué issued by the Romanian
    presidency. The EU is keeping its position concerning Jerusalem, adding that the
    only realistic solution to the conflict between Israel and Palestine involves
    the existence of two states with the same capital. European officials on Monday
    said the community executive had been notified about the Romanian Prime
    Minister’s statement over the intention to move the country’s embassy to
    Jerusalem as well as the statement of the Romanian president who said the final
    decision on the issue belonged to him. In October 2018, the Romanian Foreign
    Ministry submitted to the government a study over the effects of moving the
    country’s embassy to Jerusalem. The idea was first launched by the strongman of
    the ruling coalition in Bucharest, Social-Democrat Liviu Dragnea in late 2017. In
    response, the Palestinian Authority has provisionally recalled its ambassador
    in Bucharest.












    COMMISSIONER The European Commissioner for Health and Food Safety Vytenis
    Andriukaitis will be paying a formal visit to Bucharest over March 26th
    and 27th, the European Commission’s Representation in Bucharest has announced.
    On Tuesday Andriukaitis will be delivering a speech on Tobacco control,
    sustainable development and the right to health and will be attending a round
    of Q & A discussions. The European Official will be received by Romanian
    president Klaus Iohannis, Agriculture Minister Petre Daea and the Minister of
    Healthcare Sorina Pintea. On Wednesday, the European official is to attend the
    opening of the fourth annual conference on tobacco control staged by the
    European Network for Smoking and Tobacco Prevention jointly with the Romanian
    Society of Pneumology.










    POPE
    The apostolic visit to Romania by Pope Francis will be taking place over May 31st
    and June 2nd during which he will be visiting Bucharest, Sumuleu
    Ciuc in the centre of Romania, Iasi in the north-east and Blaj also in central
    Romania, the presidential administration announced on Monday. According to the
    same sources, the Pontiff and Romanian president Klaus Iohannis will be having
    talks on May 31st, followed by a meeting with the authorities, civil
    society and the diplomatic corps. The Pope is also to see the head of the
    Romanian Orthodox Church, patriarch Daniel in Bucharest. The Pope’s visit comes
    upon the invitation of the Romanian president Klaus Iohannis. This is the
    second visit paid to Romania, a country with an Orthodox majority, by a
    Pontiff, after that of Pope John Paul II in 1999.




    (translated by
    bill)

  • March 22, 2019

    March 22, 2019

    BREXIT – There is a real chance for Britain’s orderly exit from the EU, Romanian President Klaus Iohannis, who takes part in the spring European Council in Brussels said on Friday. He also said that, for the Bucharest authorities, the main concern is the Romanian community living in the UK. On Thursday, EU leaders agreed to Brexit being postponed and offered Britain two exit scenarios.




    REPORT – Romania’s constant economic growth in the past years is not being felt by large categories of Romanians, European Commissioner for Regional Policy, Corina Cretu, said Friday in Bucharest. Corina Cretu, who attended the presentation of the country report as part of the European semester, and the conference titled “Investment priorities for Romania 2021-2027”, talked about the need for big investment in healthcare services, transport infrastructure, energy and environment. The report points out to the fact that the economic growth model based on consumption is affecting the country’s capacity to catch up with the developed countries. The document also signals the fact that Romania’s medium and long-term foreign debt risks exceeding 60% of the GDP and that economy is affected by the salary increases which are not correlated with productivity.




    VISIT – Romanian PM Viorica Dancila is paying a visit to the US between March 23 and 26, to attend the Conference of the American Israel Public Affairs Committee (AIPAC). The visit takes place at the invitation of the AIPAC President, Morton Fridman, and of the AIPAC executive director Howard Kohr. According to a release of the Bucharest Government, the visit mirrors the intensified bilateral dialogue and is part of Bucharest’s efforts to consolidate the partnerships Romania has with the US and Israel.




    INAUGURATION — Pope Francis inaugurated from the Vatican, through a videocinference, the new centre of the Scholas Occurrentes Foundation, at the National School of Political Science and Public Administration in Bucharest. Scholas Occurrentes is an international organization present in 190 countries that integrates, through its network, almost 450 thousand schools and education networks. It seeks to generate a paradigm shift in education through the integration of communities, education with focus on those with fewer resources through the commitment of all.




    MIGRATION – 4.4 million migrants entered the EU countries in 2017, a figure, which includes migration inside the EU, data released by Eurostat show. The statistical office of the European Union registered 2.8 million migrants in the 28 member states from outside the union as well as 1.9 million people who already were in a member state and migrated to another. At the same time, 3.1 million migrants have left a state in the EU. More immigrants than migrants have been registered in 22 EU countries. The number of emigrants exceeded immigrants in six countries, Bulgaria, Croatia, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland and Romania. The largest number of immigrants was reported by Malta (46 per 1,000 inhabitants. Luxembourg reported the largest number of emigrants in 2017 (23 per 1,000 inhabitants).




    rescEU – The consolidate civil protection mechanism, rescEU, aimed at strengthening collective response to natural disaster across the EU, has come into force on Thursday, the European Commission reports. To ensure a better protection of citizens, the European Parliament, the EU Council and the Commission reached an agreement in December last year to consolidate the current civil protection mechanism. Under the new mechanism member states will be able to access an additional response capacity in case of disasters, medical emergencies, chemical, biological, radiological and nuclear incidents. Europe has been affected by scores of disasters in recent years, which left hundreds dead and produced damages in the billions of euros. (Translated by Elena Enache)



  • Romanian clergymen beatified by the Vatican

    Romanian clergymen beatified by the Vatican

    On Tuesday, Pope Francis signed a decree on the beatification of the
    7 Romanian Greek-Catholic bishops who sacrificed their lives for faith.
    According to the official website of the Holy See, they are Valeriu Traian
    Frentiu, Vasile Aftenie, Ioan Suciu, Tit Liviu Chinezu, Ioan Balan, Alexandru
    Rusu and Iuliu Hossu. All of them died in communist prisons or under strict
    political police surveillance between 1950 and 1970, because they refused to
    trade their freedom for renouncing their religion. Romania has never
    experienced religious wars, Inquisition practices or burnings at the stake.

    In
    the royal Constitution of 1923, the Orthodox and Greek-Catholic Churches, both
    having made tremendous contributions to the accomplishment of the Great Union of
    1918, were defined as national faiths. The Greek Catholic belief was outlawed
    by the communist regime shortly after World War II, at the orders and following
    the example of the Soviet occupiers, which would not tolerate the spiritual
    authority of the Vatican on the believers this side of the Iron Curtain. Just
    like in western Ukraine, Romanian Greek Catholicism was prohibited, and its
    property either nationalised, or transferred to the Orthodox Church.


    My battle is done, yours must go on, Bishop Iuliu Hossu reportedly
    said on his deathbed. His faith became legal once again after the
    anti-communist revolution of 1989, and the Greek Catholic Church regained some
    of its assets. In the latest census, 86.5% of the citizens of Romania declared
    their affiliation to the Orthodox faith, only 4.6% declared themselves
    Roman-Catholic and less than 1% Greek Catholic.


    According to the Greek Catholic Bishop of Cluj, Florin Crihalmeanu,
    the beatification ceremony might be performed by Pope Francis himself, in Blaj,
    at the famous Field of Liberty, a place of paramount symbolic importance for
    the identity of Transylvanian Romanians. This may well be the climax of the
    visit His Holiness will pay to Romania between May 31st and June 2nd.
    Under the motto Let’s Walk Together, the Pope will visit the capital city
    Bucharest, Iasi, the largest city in the east of the country and home to a
    sizeable Roman-Catholic community, Blaj in the centre, which is the spiritual
    capital of Romanian Greek-Catholics, and the Marian shrine in Sumuleu Ciuc, in
    the centre of Romania.


    According to the Patriarchy spokesman Vasile Banescu, the visit has
    been confirmed and it highlights the good relations between the Romanian
    Orthodox Church and the Roman-Catholic Church. In 1999, Romania was the first
    country with an Orthodox majority ever to be visited by a Sovereign Pontiff.
    Invited by the Christian Democrat President Emil Constantinescu and the then
    Orthodox Patriarch, Teoctist, John Paul II was received with love and
    enthusiasm by hundreds of thousands of Romanians, who, regardless of their
    faith, saw him as the most beloved Pope in history and a man who had played a
    vital role in the ousting of communist dictatorships.

  • January 11, 2019

    January 11, 2019

    EU Romania’s
    first mandate at the presidency of the EU Council represents a good opportunity
    for Bucharest to reiterate its commitment to consolidating the European project
    – Romanian president Klaus Iohannis has today said during his meeting with the
    president of the European Commission Jean-Claude Juncker and with members of
    the College of Commissioners. According to Iohannis this mandate will highlight
    Romania’s desire to have a successful, result-oriented mandate that will move
    the European agenda forward taking into account the complex background of the
    following six months. Romania’s presidency of the EU must provide hope as it
    takes place at a difficult moment for Europe and for this reason it will unfold
    in several different stages, the head of the head of the European Commission
    has said. Jean Claude Juncker and the members of the College of Commissioners
    who arrived in Bucharest on Thursday are to be received today by the country’s
    Prime Minister Viorica Dancila and other ministers. Their visit to Bucharest
    comes against the backdrop of Romania’s taking over the EU rotating presidency
    marked last night through a series of speeches about the importance of this
    event and about Romania’s place inside the EU.












    VISIT Pope Francis will be paying a visit to Romania over May 31st
    and June 2nd, the presidential administration in Bucharest has
    announced. According to the same sources, the Pope will be visiting capital
    Bucharest, the cities of Iasi, in north-eastern Romania, and Blaj, in the
    centre. We recall that in 1999 Pope John Paul ll paid a historic visit to
    Romania, being the first visit paid by a Pontiff to a country with an Orthodox
    majority after the Schism of 1054. Pope John Paul thanked the Romanian Orthodox
    Church for inviting him to pay an unforgettable ecumenical visit to a country,
    which he described as a bridge between the West and East and which is, as
    tradition has it, ‘The Garden of the Mother of God.










    TRANSPORTATION The Transportation
    Commission in the European Parliament has given up on passing a number of
    measures considered discriminatory by Eastern European transportation entities,
    including Romanian ones. They protested yesterday in Brussels against changing
    relevant legislation against the background of growing protectionism in Western
    European states. In the opinion of easterners, the new proposals would place a
    significant cost burden in terms of operations, restricting international road
    transportation within the EU. One measure was supposed to ban the weekly rest
    period being spent within vehicles, another dictating a mandatory home rest
    period every four weeks. One other contested measure was equipping vehicles
    with smart speedometers by late 2024.








    WEATHER Bad weather wreaked havoc on eleven counties in Romania’s east and
    south-west. A yellow weather warning has been issued for seven counties in
    Romania where trees have been broken by the heavy snowfalls or the gale-force
    wind. Road traffic has been disrupted on various highway sections, but
    according to the General Inspectorate for Emergency Situations, no victims have
    been reported. 52 hundred firefighters are ready to take part in rescue
    operations all over the country. The weather is cold in most of the regions
    with moderate snowfalls in the center and the mountains. Temperatures are
    ranging between -7 and 3 degrees Celsius with a noon reading in Bucharest of
    zero degrees.








    EUROPE CARES An initiative entitled ‘Europe Cares’ which is meant to become a
    mouthpiece for parents with disabled children in 7 European countries, Romania
    included, has been launched today. Through this initiative parents are calling
    for inclusionary education for their children. At present the EU’s legislation
    does not provide for the education of the disabled children, a fact that
    fosters a series of issues such as exclusion or segregation. 70 million
    disabled people are living in Europe at present.




    (translated by
    bill)

  • November 4, 2018 UPDATE

    November 4, 2018 UPDATE

    Muscat — The opening of the Romanian Embassy in Muscat, the capital of Oman, as well as the lifting of visa requirements for the citizens of this country who have diplomatic or official passports are significant steps in the process of expanding relations between Romania and Oman, said the Romanian PM Viorica Dancila, who is paying a 3-day official visit to Oman. PM Dancila met with Sayyid Fahd bin Mahmoud al Said, the Deputy Prime Minister for the Council of Ministers in the Sultanate of Oman with who, she analyzed opportunities for cooperation in such fields as agriculture, tourism, infrastructure, healthcare and education. According to Radio Romania’s correspondent the PM Dancila encouraged investments in Romania, and she underscored that the business environment is supported following the modification of the public-private partnership legislation. The next leg of her tour of the region is Qatar. Last month Viorica Dancila made a tour of the Middle East which included Turkey, the United Arab Emirates and Kuwait. Also on Friday PM Viorica Dancila met with her Israeli counterpart on the sidelines of a regional meeting held in neighboring Bulgaria.



    PSD — The National executive committee of the Social Democratic Party — PSD, the main party in the ruling coalition in Bucharest, is meeting on Monday, with the clear purpose of nominating the leaders of the Financial Supervisory Authority and of the National Council of the Audiovisual. The press speculates that they might also discuss the details of the government reshuffle announced by the PM Dancila. The meeting takes place against the backdrop of increasing tension between the supporters of the party leader and speaker of the Chamber of Deputies, Liviu Dragnea, and those of the general mayor of Bucharest, Gabriela Firea.



    IMF — An IMF mission headed by the IMF chief for Romania, Jaewoo Lee, will be in Bucharest between November 6th to 12th. According to the IMF resident representative in Romania and Bulgaria, Alejandro Hajdenberg, the IMF experts will look into the recent economic and financial developments in Romania, will update the macro-economic prospects and discuss the 2019 budget. At present, Romania does not have a running funding agreement with the IMF, but the financial institution is annually assessing the evolution of the Romanian economy.



    Chisinau — Moody’s rating agency confirmed the long term rating for Moldova at B3 with outlook stable. Moody’s experts say the ex-Soviet state enjoys solid economic growth, with a moderate government debt and an improvement in institutional capacity, against the backdrop of moderate political risks and diminished risks in the banking sector. However, they remarked a persistence of difficulties in the governing act and a reduced political predictability. According to Moody’s, Moldova’s economic growth was solid in the first semester of 2018, the real GDP reporting a 4.5% growth as compared to a 2.9% growth in the same period of last year.



    Rome — Roman and Greek-Catholic bishops from Romania on Monday will start a one-week visit to Rome, where they will meet with Pope Francis. This is the 5th visit to the Vatican by the members of the Episcopal Conference of Romania after the fall of the Communist dictatorship in 1989 and the first visit to meet the current Pope. Joining the conference members is also the Roman-Catholic bishop of neighboring Moldova. We remind you that in 1999 Romania became the 2nd country with a majority Orthodox population to be visited by a Pope, namely Pope John Paul II.



    Bucharest city hall — The general mayor of Bucharest, Gabriela Firea, will pay a visit to Madrid on Monday. Together with the mayor of Madrid, Manuela Carmena Castrillo, she will sign a memorandum of cooperation between the two cities in the fields of sustainable development, infrastructure, education, culture and tourism. Gabriela Firea will also meet with Madrid city hall experts specialized in smart cities and infrastructure as well as with the representatives of companies dealing in urban planning and urban governance. The Bucharest general mayor will also participate in the opening of the World Forum on Urban Violence and Education for Coexistence and Peace, and will meet with the president of the Madrid Community, Angel Garrido.



    Dublin — The Irish Prime Minister Leo Varadkar has warned that Brexit undermines the agreement known as “Good Friday Agreement” which put an end to decades of violence in Northern Ireland, the BBC reports. “Anything that pulls the communities apart in Northern Ireland undermines the Good Friday Agreement, and anything that pulls Britain and Ireland apart undermines that relationship,” said Mr Varadkar in an interview to the state television RTE. One of the biggest sticking points in the Brexit negotiations is the Irish border, and the UK government says that nothing that they agree with the EU will risk a return to a hard border. Brexit is scheduled for March 2019.



    Tennis – The pair made up of the Romanian tennis player Horia Tecau and the Dutch Jean-Julien Rojer on Sunday lost the doubles final of the ATP Masters tournament hosted by Paris, which had total prizes up for grabs worth 4.8 million Euros. Tecau and Rojer were defeated 2-0 in the sets by the pair made up of the Spanish Marcel Granollers and the American Rajeev Ram. In Saturday’s semifinals, Tecau and Rojer defeated 2-0, in the sets, the 2nd seeded pair made up of the Americans Mike Bryans and Jack Sock. Their adversaries in the final took advantage of the injury of Croat Mate Pavic, who could no longer team up with the Austrian Oliver Marach. For Tecau this is going to be the 54th doubles final in his career and the 3rd in 2018, after the titles won in Dubai and Winston-Salem. (translation by L. Simion)

  • Miracle

    Miracle

    Ionut avait l’habitude de se rendre au chevet des mourants, de rassurer les familles en leur offrant le réconfort d’une vie possible après la mort. Il en avait vu des gens mourir, des personnes qui fréquentaient l’église depuis ses débuts, vieillissant à leurs côtés, mais ce qu’il n’avait jamais eu l’occasion de voir, c’est une femme dans la fleur de l’âge, avec toute la vie devant elle, être soudainement rappelée par le Seigneur.

  • September 23, 2018 UPDATE

    September 23, 2018 UPDATE

    SOCIAL PROGRESS — Romania stagnates this year in the Global Report of Social Progress, ranking 44th out of 146 countries, just as last year, according to a release of the Initiative for Competitiveness. Romania’s social performance slightly improves in terms of access to water, shelter, environment quality, tolerance and inclusion and individual rights but deteriorates in terms of medical services, personal safety, access to knowledge and to IT&C. In terms of GDP per capita, Romania ranks 45th out of 146 countries. According to the report, a real advance of the social progress index in Romania depends on the quality of social investment, education and connection with the technology of the future, as national priorities.




    POPE – Pope Francis paid tribute on Sunday to Lithuanians who suffered and died during Soviet and Nazi occupations, on the day the country remembered the near-extermination of its Jewish community during the Holocaust. During Mass in Santakos Park, Pope Francis honored both Jewish victims of Nazi-era executions and the Lithuanians who were deported to Siberian gulags or were tortured and oppressed at home during five decades of Soviet occupation. The Pope will tour Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania as they celebrate 100 years since declaring independence following World War I.




    OLYMPIAD – Romanian pupils won nine prizes at the 4th International French Language Olympiad in Ohrid, Macedonia, held between the 15th and the 19th of September. They won four first prizes (two in individual and two in team events), three second prizes and two third prizes. The International French Language Olympiad gathered pupils from 6 countries members of the International Organization of La Francophonie: Albania, Armenia, Bulgaria, Macedonia, the Republic of Moldova and Romania. The competition is enlisted in the program of the activities carried out by the Regional Office of La Francophonie for Central and Eastern Europe. Romanian pupils also got very good results at other international competitions, such as the International Physics Olympiad held in July, where they won five medals, at the Central European Olympiad in Informatics, where they won two gold and two silver medals and at the International Earth Science Olympiad in Warsaw, in August.




    BUCHAREST – Events celebrating the City of Bucharest ended on Sunday with a concert of the British singer Rod Stewart. Romania’s capital city marked 559 years since it was first mentioned in official records, as well as 100 years since the Union of December 1, 1918, when the Romanian provinces were united into a nation state. On Friday, the famous Romanian panpipe player Gheorghe Zamfir gave a memorable show and on Saturday Bucharest hosted one of the biggest 3D video-mapping shows in the world.




    RESEARCH – Ministers from Romania hold the EU record in appearing at EU council meetings, being present in over 90 percent of the meetings, according to research from Danish think tank Europa. The figures – based on minutes from council meetings in the period 2015-2018 – also showed that ministers from Slovakia and Poland appeared the least, leaving their chairs to diplomats in almost every other meeting.




    ELECTION — Almost 30 Romanians are on the candidate lists of political parties in Belgium, in the local elections scheduled for October 14. They are trying to win local councilor seats in several localities, including the capital Brussels. The initiator of the “DreptLaVot” project, Ioana Banach, says in a post on the RomBel website, of the Romanian community in Belgium that more than ever before, Romanian candidates matter at these elections, given the fact that in Brussels, for instance, they account for 9% of the population.

  • April 28, 2017

    April 28, 2017

    DIGITAL MARKET — The digital single market is an objective in the EU region and the yearly costs for its creation stay around 415 billion euros, the vice president of the European Commission, Andrus Ansip, has today said in Bucharest during a conference entitled Eurosfat 2017. According to the EU official, one of the digital single market’s benefits is the coming into effect as of June 15th 2017 of the new regulations concerning the service of roaming at EU level. On the other hand, the EU official has underlined that the European Commission is working on liberalizing the citizens’ access to digital content as well as the online purchase of goods and services. Andrus Ansip is paying a formal visit to Romania for talks with Romanian officials, the Representation of the European Commission in Romania informs.



    TENNIS — Romanian tennis player Simona Halep, currently ranking fifth in the world standings, will today be taking on Anastasija Sevastova of Latvia in the quarterfinals of the tournament in Stuttgart with 760 thousand dollars in prize money. We recall that Simona has been eliminated from the doubles contest. Another two players, Irina Begu and Sorana Cirstea are representing Romania in the tournament in Istanbul.



    POPE — Pope Francis is today taking part in a peace conference in Cairo staged by the Al Azhar Islamic University. The Pontiff is to meet a high Sunni authority, Sheik Ahmad Muhammad al-Tayeb and the head of the Coptic Orthodox Church, Theodore the second of Alexandria, as well as leaders of a small Catholic community. Jointly with Bartholomew, the Ecumenical Patriarch of Constantinople, the Pope is expected to deliver a speech at the Al-Azhar University. According to experts, the presence of the Pope and the Orthodox Patriarch at a Sunni University shortly after the bloody attacks against the Coptic Christians in Egypt during Easter, is a sign of unity between the Christians of various denominations, expressing their readiness for dialogue with the Muslims who reject violence and terrorism in the name of religion. Islam is the state religion in Egypt but the Coptic Christians account for 10% of the country’s 90 million people. The Pontiff is also expected to see president Abdel Fattah el-Sisi.



    VACCINES — Romania is to notify the European Commission of its intention to put on hold its export of vaccines against the background of a measles epidemic currently affecting 5,000 people in this country, Health Minister Florian Bodog has announced. The Romanian official has added that the authorities intend to block exports in the case of other medicines including those stipulated in the national health programmes, medicines used in the treatment of various types of cancers. Minister Bodog has also said that he wants the Romanian patients not to be disadvantaged in comparison with patients from other countries where these medicines are at higher prices.



    AMBASSADOR According to Romania’s ambassador in Washington, George Maior, the 20 years of Romanian-US strategic partnership have confirmed the fact that the US doesn’t have a better and closer partner in southeastern Europe than Romania. The Romanian diplomat on Thursday hosted a special dinner, which brought together several Republican members of the US’ House of Representatives, devoted to celebrating 20 years of Romanian-US strategic partnership. The tight cooperation in the field of security and the latest positive developments in the fields of economy, trade and investment have been underscored on this occasion. The US officials have mentioned the US Congress and administration appreciate the evolution and progress registered in terms of bilateral cooperation, which have turned Romania into a staunch partner for the USA.