Radio România Internațional

Tag: US

  • September 23, 2021 UPDATE

    September 23, 2021 UPDATE

    COVID-19 The COVID-19 epidemic stays on an upward
    trend in Romania. Thursday was the second consecutive day with more than 7,000 new
    cases in 24 hours (7,095 new cases out of nearly 54,000 tests). The largest
    number of infections is reported in the capital Bucharest. The number of Covid
    patients in intensive care is now over 1,000, a situation last seen in early
    May in Romania, and the number of coronavirus-related deaths was 113. Over
    300 towns and villages in the country are now on the red list of places where
    the infection rate is over 3 per thousand. Meanwhile, the total number of vaccine doses
    administered to Romanians went over 10 million on Thursday.


    MEASURES The COVID digital certificate remains a requirement for
    access to indoor events in places with infection rates of over 3 per thousand, and
    it will be compulsory for children over 12, instead of over 6 as originally
    stipulated. Another measure allows businesses to stay open after 6pm, in places
    with infection rates between 3 and 6 per thousand. A night curfew will be in
    place over weekends wherever the infection rate is over 6 per thousand, and
    throughout the week in places with infection rates above 7.5 per thousand. PM
    Florin Cîţu also announced today that vaccinated people will be allowed to
    leave their homes without a sworn statement in places under curfew or lockdown.
    Meanwhile, an emergency order on the COVID
    digital certificate has been endorsed by the Senate and is next to be discussed
    in the Chamber of Deputies. The digital certificate was created at EU level to
    facilitate free travel during the pandemic. The document, which includes a QR
    code, certifies that the holder has been vaccinated, recovered from the disease
    or tested negative for COVID.


    AMBASSADOR
    Romania has been a candidate for accession to the Visa Waiver programme for
    almost 15 years, said the new Romanian ambassador to Washington, Andrei Muraru,
    who mentioned that there are only three EU member states whose citizens need a
    short-stay visa on US territory. According to Andrei Muraru, the visa rejection
    rate is currently at a fairly high level, around 10%, but he pointed out that
    Romanian and US authorities are working to bring it down to the maximum 3% allowed
    for the Visa Waiver. The Romanian ambassador to the US also said that an
    information campaign will be organized in Bucharest for citizens to find out
    how they can apply for a visa, why their applications are turned down and why
    they should not apply if they do not meet the criteria set by the American
    side.


    NAVY The
    Romanian Navy’s Vice-admiral Constantin Bălescu Minelayer will take part in
    the EUNAVFOR MED operation Irini, in the Mediterranean Sea, between
    the 1st of October and the end of this year. Romanian marines will
    ensure compliance with the arms embargo enforced by the UN on Libya. The
    mission also targets illegal trafficking in oil products, drugs and people, by
    monitoring sea traffic and inspections of suspicious vessels in the
    Mediterranean. A combat diver unit is on board, and the 85 crew members have
    been tested, vaccinated against COVID-19 and isolated in Romanian Navy
    facilities prior to the operation.


    INSURANCE The government passed an emergency order enabling drivers who need to
    have their cars repaired under an insurance policy issued by City Insurance to
    receive their claims more quickly under the Insurance Guarantee Fund. They will
    no longer have to wait for a court to declare the company bankrupt. When its
    license was cancelled, City Insurance had 3 million civil liability policies
    issued to car owners. The Prosecutor General’s Office Thursday had documents
    seized from the company headquarters, as part of a criminal investigation
    following a complaint filed by the Financial Supervising Authority.


    INFRINGEMENT The European Commission Thursday sent Romania and Poland letters of
    formal notice for not correctly incorporating certain aspects of the Offshore
    Safety Directive into their legal systems. These letters of formal notice are
    actually the official start of the infringement procedure. Romania and Poland
    have two months to address the shortcomings, otherwise the Commission may decide to
    send a reasoned opinion. Also on Thursday, the
    Commission took measures against 19 member states, Romania included, for
    failing to take the necessary steps to ensure their citizens benefit from the
    EU audio-visual mass media and telecoms legislation. (tr. A.M. Popescu)

  • September 7, 2021

    September 7, 2021

    CRISIS In Romania, deputy PM Dan Barna and the other USR PLUS ministers resigned on Tuesday from the Liberal Florin Citus coalition cabinet, as they had announced on Monday night. USR PLUS believe the PM dynamited the coalition after unexpectedly dismissing the justice minister Stelian Ion. The party is invited to have talks with president Klaus Iohannis this afternoon, to discuss the governmental crisis. On Friday, USR PLUS and the nationalist party AUR tabled a no-confidence motion against the Citu cabinet. The standing bureaus of the Senate and Chamber of Deputies convene today in a new attempt to agree on a timetable for the motion.



    BUDGET In spite of the resignation of the USR PLUS ministers, PM Florin Citu has convened a cabinet meeting today, to discuss a new budget adjustment. The Prime Minister announced last night that the budget adjustment bill would be passed whether or not USR PLUS party pulls out of the government coalition. With todays adjustment, most funds will go to the health ministry, public finances, development and investments. Budget cuts will affect the labour ministry, the Senate and the Court of Accounts.



    DIPLOMACY Bucharest is hosting as of today the Annual Meeting of Romanian Diplomats, which brings together the heads of Romanias diplomatic missions and consular offices abroad. The meeting is chaired by the foreign minister Bogdan Aurescu. The main topic of this years meeting is the concept of resilience, which gains importance in the context of the pandemic-related crisis. The Romanian diplomats will also discuss ways to concentrate their efforts on emerging developments like climate change, digital transition, the growing role of new technologies and cyber security. The Romanian diplomacy chief Bogdan Aurescu has talks scheduled today with his Moldovan counterpart, Nicolae Popescu, who is also taking part in the meeting. The bilateral talks focus on strengthening Romanias support for the reforms implemented by the new government in Chişinău and for Moldovas EU accession efforts.



    VISIT The president of Romania, Klaus Iohannis, will be on an official visit to Switzerland on Thursday, at the invitation of his counterpart Guy Parmelin. According to the presidency, the visit takes place in the context of this years anniversary of 110 years of diplomatic relations between the two states. The talks will focus on strengthening bilateral cooperation, including economic cooperation, with an emphasis on investments. Switzerland is the 10th-largest foreign investor in Romania.



    COVID-19 The number of new Covid-19 infections remains high in Romania, with 1,035 new cases reported on Monday out of around 18,000 tests. The frequency of cases for the past 14 days has reached or gone over 1 per thousand in Bucharest and 4 other counties. Over the past 24 hours, 25 patients died. The number of hospitalised patients is over 3,300, 405 of them in intensive care. Of the patients in hospitals, 107 are under 18, and 5 of them are in ICU. Over 8,000 people have received a vaccine in the last 24 hours, but the total number of fully immunised people is nearly 5.2 million, still less than one-third of the total eligible population.



    US OPEN The Romanians Monica Niculescu/Gabriela Ruse qualified in the quarter-finals of the doubles competition at US Open, the last Grand Slam of the year, after defeating Leylah Fernandez (Canada)/Erin Routliff (New Zealand). The Romanians are next to take on Alexa Guarachi (Chile)/ Desirae Krawczyk (USA), who beat Raluca Olaru (Romania)/Nadia Kicenok (Ukraine). In the mens doubles, Horia Tecău (Romania) / Kevin Krawietz (Germany), seed no. 6, are playing today in the quarter-finals against the Americans Steve Johnson/Sam Querrey. (tr. A.M. Popescu)

  • August 31, 2021

    August 31, 2021

    COVID-19 Romania is still in the green
    tier in spite of the rising number of Covid-19 infections. Authorities in this
    country have lately reported 700 new cases and 11 related fatalities. 280
    people are being treated in intensive care units and the coordinator of the
    country’s vaccine rollout, Valeriu Gheorghita, has cautioned that Romania is
    going to have over two thousand daily cases in mid-September. The situation is expected
    to worsen as the Delta variant is becoming dominant. On the other hand, people’s
    interest in vaccination remains low with only 5.1 million fully vaccinated
    Romanians since the beginning of the country’s vaccine rollout in late
    December.






    PULL-OUT The United States last night
    completed the withdrawal of its troops from Afghanistan putting an end to the
    longest war in the country’s history. The last US plane took off at the end of
    a two-week evacuation operation complicated by the unexpected Taliban takeover
    of capital Kabul. During the 20 year war, 25 hundred US servicemen and over 1,000
    allied troops, including 27 Romanians have been killed in the line of duty.
    According to Reuters 24 thousand Afghans have also lost their lives. In 2014,
    NATO and the USA put an end to war operations in Afghanistan, but foreign
    soldiers remained stationed in that country for another 6 years. The withdrawal
    was set through an agreement signed with the Taliban in February 2020. The
    Taliban got Kabul in mid-August, which caused panic among the Afghans who
    wanted to leave the country. 120 thousand people have been evacuated in two
    weeks in an operation marked by chaos and tragedies, stampedes, suicide and
    rocket attacks. The Taliban are
    celebrating the victory but the country is in for a difficult period of time
    with assets of 9 billion dollars frozen and an economic and humanitarian crisis
    looming large.






    DAY The Romanian language will
    continue to keep us united and close to the country, Romanian president Klaus
    Iohannis says in his message on Romanian Language Day celebrated every year on
    August 31st. Iohannis has congratulated all those contributing to
    the cultivation and the promotion of the Romanian language and values who are
    working in several fields of activity such as literature, science and research,
    academia, and various publishing houses. For the Romanian nationals living
    abroad, their native tongue is what makes them feel at home wherever they are
    and in a Diaspora as large, the language’s linking role is more important than
    ever. Dear Romanians from all over the world, do not stop loving the Romanian
    language and try to cultivate the love of it among children so that they may
    appreciate it and use it correctly, the president went on to say.






    MEETING EU interior ministers are
    convening today in Brussels for talks over the situation in Afghanistan after
    the Taliban takeover and assess the impact of a potential wave of migrants from
    that country over the continent. According to news agencies, the EU governments
    want to avoid a repeat of the chaotic migratory wave of 2015, which took the
    bloc by surprise causing division among its states. Some European countries
    fear that Afghanistan may become home to terrorist groups who may mastermind attacks
    against the West as it happened on September 11th 2001 in the USA. The EU
    ministers are going to assess the ways of evacuating the Afghans who worked
    with EU countries and are now expecting reprisals from the Taliban. According
    to Romanian Interior Minister, Lucian Bode, the country can receive Afghan
    refugees, upon a thorough checking from the state’s structures.






    TENNIS Romanian
    tennis player Sorana Cirstea is today playing Veronika Kudermetova of Russia in
    the first round of the US Open, the year’s last Grand Slam. Another three
    Romanians on the competition’s main draw, Irina Begu, Ana Bogdan and Gabriela
    Ruse lost the matches they played on Monday, in the competition’s inaugural
    round. Romania’s best representative in the prestigious competition, Simona
    Halep, a former world’s number one, has qualified for the competition’s second
    round after a win against Italian Camila Giorgi and will next be playing
    Kristina Kucova of Slovakia.






    EVENTS A
    series of cultural events simultaneously staged in Romania and the Republic of
    Moldova, an ex-soviet Romanian-speaking country on Tuesday, August 31st
    marked the Romanian Language Day. President Klaus Iohannis has hailed the
    efforts made by a series of institutions to maintain the access of Romanians to
    leaning their mother tongue. Set in 2013 by Parliament in Bucharest, the
    Romanian Language Day coincides with the national day of the Republic of
    Moldova and is an homage paid to the national awakening movement in the
    neighboring country. On August 31st 1989, while still under Soviet
    occupation, Parliament in Chisinau, surrounded by 750 thousand people, a sixth
    of the Republic’s population at that time, declared Romanian a state language
    and replaced the Cyrillic alphabet, imposed by the occupants, with the Latin
    one.




    (bill)

  • May 25, 2021 UPDATE

    May 25, 2021 UPDATE

    US-RUSSIA US president Joe Biden and his Russian counterpart Vladimir Putin
    are to meet in Geneva on June 16th, the White House announced on
    Tuesday. ‘The leaders will discuss the full range of pressing issues as we seek
    to restore predictability and stability to the US-Russia relationship’, the
    White House spokeswoman Jen Psaki has said. This is going to be the first
    meeting between the two leaders since Joe Biden’s coming to power and will be
    taking place amid serious tensions between the two states. The meeting also comes
    after the G7 and NATO summits which are expected to have a joint anti-Moscow position.






    MEETING The Senate and the
    Chamber of Deputies are to convene in Bucharest on Wednesday for talks over the
    National Plan of Resilience and Recovery, Ludovic Orban, the president of the
    Chamber of deputies announced on Tuesday. The main opposition party PSD
    insisted the government present the plan before Parliament otherwise the Social
    democrats may not endorse a European treaty under which the member states are
    to pay higher contributions to the EU budget. Romania has pledged to present
    the plan to Brussels by the end of May, one month after the date required by
    the European Commission.






    CAMPAIGN Romania’s Prime Minister Florin Citu on
    Thursday announced the government would launch a pro-vaccine media campaign.
    Citu says that his role as head of the Executive is to lead a louder campaign
    than the anti-vaccine voices promoted by a couple of TV channels. The Prime
    Minister has given assurances that non-vaccinated people are not going to be
    discriminated against. According to the RO Vaccination platform, since the
    vaccine rollout kicked off in Romania in late December 2020, 25.93% of the
    eligible population, 16 years old and over, more than 4,170,000 people have got
    at least one dose of the anti-Covid vaccine. According to the same sources, 20.69%
    of the eligible population, accounting for 3,330,000 people, has also got the booster.
    On the other hand, the number of Covid infections is on a downward trend. 381
    new infections were reported on Tuesday out of 32 thousand tests conducted in
    the past 24 hours. 63 new fatalities have been reported bringing the death toll
    to 30,040. 545 patients are being treated in IC units.






    AGREEMENT
    The EU leaders meeting in Brussels have agreed to seal off the bloc’s airspace
    to Belarusian planes as part of sanctions against the regime of president
    Alexander Lukashenko, accused to deviating a Ryanair passenger plane flying
    from Athens to Vilnius to arrest dissident
    journalist Roman Protasevich.
    The 27 EU leaders also asked airlines to avoid flying over Belarus, agreed to
    impose additional sanctions, including of an economic nature, and called for
    the immediate release of the journalist and his partner Sofia Sapega, who is a
    Russian citizen, both of whom were arrested on Sunday. EU leaders also asked
    the International Civil Aviation Organisation to investigate what they
    described as an unprecedented and unacceptable incident and called for the
    expansion as soon as possible of the list of Belarus officials and entities
    targeted by European sanctions. Some 88 persons from Belarus, including
    president Alexander Lukashenko, as well as seven entities are already banned
    from entering the EU and have their assets frozen for repression against the
    opposition and the presidential elections of 2020, which the EU believes were
    rigged.






    (bill)



  • Foreign Ministry discusses topical issues

    Foreign Ministry discusses topical issues

    Romania has ‘exceptionally good relations with Israel, which is a strategic partner to Bucharest, but it also has ‘very good relations with the Palestinian side. The statement was made on a private tv station by the foreign minister, Bogdan Aurescu, who discussed the severe security situation in Israel and Gaza.



    The Romanian diplomat firmly condemned the rocket attacks from the territory controlled by the Islamist group Hamas over civilian targets in Israel. “We have voiced our deep regret for the loss of human lives and the hopes that this will not happen again. Unfortunately, such situations still occur, the Romanian official said.



    According to Aurescu, around 320-350 Romanian nationals, including people with dual citizenship, are currently in Gaza Strip, and the diplomatic missions in the region have been instructed to provide support to them, should such support be requested.



    Apart from this most important international issue at the moment, the Romanian diplomacy chief also discussed the delicate topic of the visas still required for the Romanian citizens who want to travel to the US, in spite of the strong strategic partnership between Washington and Bucharest and the EU criticism of the US.



    Bulgarians, Croatians, Cypriots and Romanians are the only EU citizens who need visas in order to enter the US, and the European Parliament has requested the Commission to activate the visa reciprocity mechanism and to suspend for one year the waiver of visa requirements for US citizens.



    This however is not a file of special political and diplomatic nature, but rather a technical matter. Minister Bogdan Aurescu explained that Romanians still need visas for the US because the rejection rate of 9-10% of the total number of applications is higher than the 3% ceiling admitted under the US law. Romania meets all the other criteria stipulated by the American legislation, except for the one concerning the rejection rate.



    This situation cannot be blamed on either the Romanian or the US authorities, but is related to the failure of some Romanian visa applicants to meet relevant requirements, Aurescu emphasised.



    He added that he had discussed the matter with the US Secretary of State, Antony Blinken. The two agreed that a joint Romanian-American information campaign is needed for the Romanian nationals who want to travel to the US, so as to make applicants seeking short-term stay visas in the US aware of the prerequisites for obtaining one. Those who find they do not meet these prerequisites might thus refrain from applying, and the rejection rate would therefore drop.



    There have been initiatives in the US Congress regarding possible exceptions from the visa requirements for citizens of allied countries, but such initiatives have failed, the foreign minister Bogdan Aurescu also said. (tr. A.M. Popescu)

  • April 29, 2021 UPDATE

    April 29, 2021 UPDATE




    COVID-19RO. 1.850 new cases of
    COVID-19 infection were reported on Thursday in Romania after some 35,000 tests
    were run across the country, the Strategic Communication Group announced.
    Another 138 related fatalities and 1,295 people in intensive care were also
    reported. Over 1,050,000 people have tested positive for COVID-19 since the
    start of the pandemic and 27,971 people have died to the virus. The infection
    rate continues to exceed 3 per one thousand inhabitants in the capital city
    Bucharest and in Ilfov and Cluj counties, although the numbers are dropping
    steadily. On the other hand, the Government’s special committee in charge of
    developing relaxation measures starting June 1 convened again to highlight the
    need for adapting measures to the specificity of each field of activity.
    Representatives of line associations made clear proposals for the organization
    of cultural events with the observance of safety regulations. The committee
    also discussed the gradual reopening of hotels and restaurants as more and more
    people get vaccinated. All proposals will be analyzed by working groups that
    will address each specific field. Meanwhile, the authorities are accelerating
    the vaccination campaign.




    HOLIDAY. Before the May 1st
    mini-holiday, which this year coincides with the Orthodox Easter holiday, Prime
    Minister Florin Cîţu calls on the population to keep observing anti-coronavirus
    sanitary rules, even if Romania is now on a descending slope of the third wave
    of the pandemic. He has urged the prefects and the police to take all measures
    to ensure compliance with the health rules in place. In the Romanian resorts on
    the Black Sea, over 30 thousand tourists are expected during the mini-holiday
    of May 1 and Easter. About 100 hotels will be opened, many of them already
    occupied at 70% capacity, the maximum allowed by the authorities. Tourists are
    not allowed to party on the beach, and wearing a mask is mandatory.






    PANDEMIC. The international
    community is rallying to support India, a week after that country was hit hard
    by the COVID-19 pandemic, with daily record-high numbers of infections and
    fatalities and a health system under pressure. The biggest concern is the
    so-called Indian strain of the SARS-CoV-2 virus, which spreads rapidly and
    could be even more contagious and vaccine and treatment resistant than other
    strains, the WHO has warned. With a population of nearly 1.4 billion people,
    India has reported 200 thousand deaths and over 18 million infections since the
    start of the outbreak. Some experts believe numbers could be even higher. Great
    Britain has sent oxygen concentrators and other medical equipment, while the
    United States will be shipping 60 million doses of the AstraZeneca vaccine.
    Romania has joined this international effort and delivered 200 oxygen
    concentrators via a Romanian Air Force Spartan aircraft.






    SURVEY. Romanians fear the
    economic crisis or corruption more than the COVID-19 pandemic or the outbreak
    of an armed conflict. It’s one of the findings of the Security Survey published
    by the Romanian Academy’s Center for Sociological Research. According to the
    survey, 43% of the respondents believe Romania has been a safe country after
    its NATO accession, while 37% said they felt safe during the communist period.
    As regards public confidence in state institutions, 72% of Romanians put their
    trust in the Army, followed by the Church with a 57% share and the Foreign
    Ministry with 50%.






    NATO. Romania will
    withdraw its forces from Afghanistan in coordination with other NATO members,
    starting Saturday, May 1. All 615 soldiers and over 80 tons of materials and
    logistics elements will be extracted with national and coalition military
    aircraft – the Presidential Administration in Bucharest has announced. The
    withdrawal will be carried out in stages and will take place over the next few
    months. In the anti-terrorist mission in Afghanistan, inaugurated shortly after
    the attacks of September 11, 2001 in the United States, when Bucharest was not
    yet a NATO member, 27 Romanian soldiers fell on duty.


    RECOVERY PLAN. The leaders of the
    center-right ruling coalition in Bucharest have adopted the National Recovery
    and Resilience Plan worth 29 billion Euro. The plan will be presented in
    Brussels starting May 10, when the final negotiations with European Commission
    representatives are due to take place. Prime Minister Florin Cîţu said none of
    the proposed projects will be discarded. In turn, Minister for Investment and
    European Projects, Cristian Ghinea, said funding for certain investment has
    been reduced, while budget appropriations have been readjusted to reflect the
    Commission’s recommendations.




    UNEMPLOYMENT. The unemployment rate
    stood at 5.5% in March, down by 0.2% compared to February, according to a National
    Statistics Institute report. The number of unemployed aged 15-74 stood at 464
    thousand in March, compared to 478 thousand the previous month. Broken down in
    terms of gender, unemployed men account for 5.7%, compared to 5.2% for women.
    The number of unemployed aged 24-74 account for 75.1% of the estimated number
    of unemployed in March.








    US. The United States’
    return to the international stage, the response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the
    economic recovery plan, as well as firm warnings against Russia and China, were
    some of the highlights of US president Joe Biden’s first address to the joint
    session of Congress. Now, after just 100 days, I can report to the
    nation: America is on the move again. Turning peril into possibility. Crisis
    into opportunity. Setback into strength, the White House leader said.
    According to Radio Romania’s correspondent in Washington, Joe Biden also
    addressed a message to Russian president Vladimir Putin, insisting that
    Russia’s actions will have consequences.

  • NATO, US to pull out of Afghanistan

    NATO, US to pull out of Afghanistan

    Its official: the United States and their NATO allies will be withdrawing their troops from Afghanistan in a matter of months. The pull-out takes place in the year when the Western world commemorates 2 decades since the terror attacks on the US. 9/11 triggered a massive and prompt military response from an international coalition headed by the US against Al Qaida and the fundamentalist regime in Kabul.



    “I believed that our presence in Afghanistan should be focused on the reason we went in the first place. To ensure Afghanistan would not be used as a base from which to attack our homeland again. We did that, president Joe Biden tweeted, one day after Washington announced the decision. He promised that the withdrawal of the US troops by September 1 will not be rushed and asked the Taliban to live up to their commitment not to threaten the US.



    To end the countrys longest war, which killed over 2,000 Americans and tens of thousands of Afghans, the Trump administration signed last February in Doha, Qatar, a historic agreement with the Taliban. The deal provided for the withdrawal of all US and foreign troops by May 1, provided that in the future the Taliban would prevent the operation of any terror group in the Afghan territories they control.



    NATO will also initiate the orderly, coordinated and deliberate withdrawal of its troops on May 1, reads an official news release issued at the end of a conference call of the defence and foreign ministers of the 30 Allied states. Any Taliban attack on Allied forces during the pull-out will trigger a vigorous response, the Alliance warned.



    The countries with the most substantial commitment in Afghanistan at present are the US, Germany, Turkey and Italy. Romania has over 600 troops deployed there. Bucharest was part of the coalition against terrorism ever since the latter was created, and has lost 27 people during such missions in the last 2 decades.



    The foreign minister Bogdan Aurescu and the defence minister Nicolae Ciucă appreciated the United States approach to the situation in Afghanistan, both in terms of the dialogue and coordination with the Allies, and in terms of encouraging negotiations and the peace process within Afghanistan.



    The Romanian officials highlighted Bucharests long-term commitment to the stability and security of Afghanistan, and emphasised the need to take into account the Allies and Afghanistans security interests and the importance of preserving solidarity and unity within NATO.



    Minister Ciucă stressed the importance of focusing on the implementation of consistent measures to protect the NATO forces in Afghanistan in the forthcoming period, alongside a coordinated approach to the pull out. He also praised the planning process conducted by the NATO military authorities. (tr. A.M. Popescu)

  • January 23, 2021

    January 23, 2021

    COVID-19 – A 73-year-old woman from Romania died on Friday, on the same day when she was vaccinated against Covid-19. The National Vaccination Committee pointed out that the person had multiple chronic diseases and that her death was not caused by the vaccine. The national vaccination campaign in Romania has entered its second stage, when the elderly and the people with chronic diseases are going to be vaccinated. Other categories included in the 2nd vaccination stage are: the employees of key sectors, seafarers, members of the diplomatic missions, athletes participating in international competitions as well as the homeless and the disabled. In the first stage, vaccination was for the healthcare personnel. The Prime Minister Florin Cîţu said Saturday that the authorities maintain the objective of having at least 1.2 million Romanians vaccinated with both doses by the end of March and 10.4 million by the end of September. The Prime Minister also stressed the importance of continuing to observe anti-coronavirus protection rules everywhere and at all times. Despite the recommendation of the Romania Health Ministry, restrictions generated by Covid-19 will be partially lifted in Bucharest as of Monday – the Municipal Committee for Emergency Situations announced. Theaters, cinemas, restaurants, bars, cafes and gambling halls will be able to operate, but at a capacity of maximum 30%. Official data made public on Saturday show that 2,719 new COVID-19 cases have been identified in Romania following 26.700 tests made. Another 94 people have died from COVID-19. So far, more than 709 thousand cases have been reported in Romania, and about 90% of the patients have recovered.



    Travel – All persons reaching the US by air will be required to present, upon boarding, a negative SARS-CoV-2 test or a document attesting that they have been infected but have recovered. The negative test should be made 72 hours (3 days), at the most, prior to reaching the USA – the Romanian Foreign Ministry announced. The measure, which will apply to all people over the age of 2, including to US citizens, permanent residents and citizens transiting the US, will take effect on January 26. In another move, people in risk areas, including Romania, who travel to the Netherlands by air or sea, should present, starting on Saturday, a rapid test for the new coronavirus, made no later than four hours before departure. France will also require, as of Sunday at midnight, a negative PCR Covid-19 test that needs to be taken with a maximum of 72 hours before the trip. Exempted from the rule are road transporters and cross-border workers.



    Brussels – The European Ombudsman, quoted by Reuters, has announced the launch of an investigation into the way in which the European Commission is managing the contracts for the purchase of the Covid-19 vaccines concluded with pharmaceutical companies on behalf of the EU member states. The EU has spent about 2.5 billion Euros for down payments to buy about 2.3 billion doses of vaccine from six companies that have Covid-19 vaccines approved or in the experimental phase. The prices, delivery deadlines and other important clauses in the contracts are kept secret, the European Commission claiming that confidentiality is essential to obtain the best possible contractual conditions. However, the Ombudsmans inquiry concerns the EC’s refusal to provide public access to those documents. EU states have complained about insufficient vaccine deliveries and uncertain timelines.



    Expo — The Commissioner of the Romanian Section for Expo 2020 Dubai, Ferdinand Nagy, paid a working visit to the United Arab Emirates between January 17-21. He met with Sheikh Ahmed bin Saeed Al Maktoum, the chairman of the Expo Dubai 2020 Steering Committee. During the talks, the two stressed the importance of bilateral relations, in the context of the Strategic Economic Partnership concluded in 2018. The Romanian official also had a meeting with Reem Al Hashimy, Minister of State for International Cooperation, both expressing confidence that Romanias presence at Expo 2020 Dubai will attract both the interest of visitors and of the business environment. Romania will participate in the World Exhibition with a national pavilion entitled New Nature. Expo 2020 Dubai will have the theme Connecting Minds, Creating the Future and will take place between October 1, 2021 – March 31, 2022.



    Chisinau – The president of the Committee for International Relations of the Federation Council, the upper chamber of the Russian parliament, Konstantin Kosaciov, virulently criticized the recent decision of the Constitutional Court in Chisinau, which declared unconstitutional the law that gave the Russian language a special status in Moldova, an ex-Soviet state with a majority Romanian-speaking population. Konstantin Kosaciov considers similar the Moldovan Constitutional Court’s decision and Ukraines decision of 16 January, which introduced the Ukrainian language to the countrys service sector, calling the decisions attacks on the Russian language. The Russian senator makes a link between the two measures and Republic of Moldova’s and Ukraine’s aspirations for European integration. In his opinion Russophobia becomes a systemic element of European policy, encouraged by the European Union in Russias neighborhood. The Romanian Ambassador to Chisinau, Daniel Ioniţă, on the contrary, has appreciated as correct and normal the decision of the Constitutional Court, this being an additional proof that the Romanian language must be known by all the citizens living on the territory of the Romanian-speaking Republic of Moldova. (tr. L.Simion)

  • January 21, 2021 UPDATE

    January 21, 2021 UPDATE

    COVID-19 — The Prime Minister Florin Cîţu announced that Romania has a stock of 2.4 million doses of COVID-19 vaccines to be used by the end of March. The government introduced in the second vaccination stage, which began on January 15, new categories of population, such as the people with disabilities and those who take care of them, the diplomatic staff, seafarers and athletes who participate in international competitions. The elderly and the vulnerable people will have priority, according to the governments decision that changes the vaccination strategy. Thus, the registration platform will be modified to give priority to the elderly and the vulnerable persons, so that, during one day, 25% of the appointments should be for people in key areas and 75% for vulnerable people, the Vaccination Coordination Committee announced on Thursday. Another 2,878 cases of COVID-19 have been registered in Romania in the last 24 hours, following more than 30,000 tests, the authorities announced on Thursday. Since the beginning of the pandemic, a total number of 704,000 contaminations has been reported. 641,288 patients have recovered. 69 people have died from COVID-19, which takes the death toll to more than 17,550. More than 1,000 patients are in ICUs. Most new cases in the last 24 hours have been registered in Bucharest, in Timis and Cluj counties.



    Talks – The Romanian Justice Minister, Stelian Ion, on Thursday held talks in videoconference format with Didier Reynders, the European Commissioner for Justice. The Romanian official talked about the Governments decision to urgently adopt, by the end of February, the draft law for abolishing the controversial Section for the Investigation of Crimes in the Judiciary. Other topics under discussion were related to the Rule of Law Mechanism and its relation to the Cooperation and Verification Mechanism, to how to make operational the European Prosecutors Office, how to transpose and implement EU directives, how to digitalize the justice system in Romania. Commissioner Reynders expressed his willingness to cooperate with the Romanian authorities in order to ensure the predictability and sustainability of the justice reform process. The stability, predictability and coherence of the justice laws are a priority for the Justice Ministry, and the correct and complete transposition of all EU directives is a priority of the Government Program, said justice minister Stelian Ion.



    US — The Democrat Joe Biden is, as of Wednesday, the new US president. He took the oath of office during an atypical inauguration ceremony. Against the background of the coronavirus pandemic, hundreds of thousands of US flags were installed in Washington DC, where visitors from around the country would have normally stood to watch the presidential inauguration. Romanian political leaders have conveyed their congratulations to Joe Biden. President Klaus Iohannis voiced confidence that Bucharest and Washington will continue to develop their Strategic Partnership, to the benefit of the two nations, and work together in the spirit of genuine trans-Atlantic ties. “We will repair our alliances and engage with the world once again,” President Biden said in his speech.



    Commemoration – Anti-Semitism, xenophobia and racism are current dangers that must be firmly countered by society, the Romanian Senate Speaker Anca Dragu said on Thursday, on the occasion of the commemoration of 80 years since the Bucharest Pogrom of January 1941. The victims of the legionnaire pogrom in Bucharest (the interwar far right), of January 21-23, 1941, were commemorated, on Thursday, by wreath laying ceremonies and online transmissions on the Facebook page of the Federation of Jewish Communities in Romania. The historical moment was also marked as part of the debate “The Jewish Quarter under the terror of the Legionnaires pogrom in January 1941.” The pogrom in Bucharest, during which at least 120 Jews were killed, was the continuation of the violent actions initiated by members of the legionnaire movement, which included murders, arrests, robberies, ill-treatment, and the desecration of cemeteries and places of worship.



    Migrants — The Romanian border police in Nădlac and Vărşand (west) caught 42 citizens from Afghanistan and Pakistan, who were planning to illegally cross the border in Hungary heading for European countries. They were hidden in eight goods trucks driven by Romanian, Turkish and Czech drivers. The migrants, aged between 17 and 28, had asked for asylum in Romania. The border police are making investigations to establish whether drivers are involved in migrant trafficking.



    NATO – A detachment of the Spanish Air Forces, consisting of about 130 soldiers – pilots and technical personnel – and six Eurofighter Typhoon aircraft, will carry out enhanced Air Policing missions under NATO command in February and March, together with the Romanian Air Forces aircraft such as F-16 Fighting Falcon, MiG-21 LanceR and Romanian soldiers, shows a communiqué of the Romanian Defense Ministry. The deployment of the Spanish detachment at the Mihail Kogălniceanu Air Base (southeastern Romania) is part of the implementation of the Action Plan for ensuring NATOs operational capacity on the Alliances eastern flank and it demonstrates NATO’s unity and determination in response to security challenges. The Defense Ministry points out that the Air Policing missions and the joint trainings contribute to the development of the reaction and deterrence capacity, as well as to the strengthening of interoperability between the Romanian and Spanish Air Forces, proving involvement and determination in the context of COVID-19 pandemic challenges. (tr. L. Simion)

  • January 20, 2021

    January 20, 2021

    COVID-19 Ro – The Romanian government is meeting today to analyze a bill which includes the disabled and homeless people in the second stage of the ongoing national vaccination campaign. The draft law proposes, among other things, the extension of the population groups for vaccination against COVID-19 by including new priority categories that are part of the critical infrastructure or of the staff undertaking missions outside the national territory. The second stage of the national vaccination campaign against Covid-19 is under way in Romania, targeting people over 65, people with chronic diseases and employees in key domains. About 6 million Romanians have the right to be vaccinated in this stage. Since the onset of the coronavirus pandemic, more than 700,000 cases of Covid-19 have been confirmed across the country and 635,000 patients have recovered. The total death toll has reached 17,485. About 1,000 patients are in ICUs.



    Protests — The protests organized by Cartel Alfa – one of the main trade unions in Romania – continue, today, with the picketing of the Finance Ministry in Bucharest. On Tuesday, the trade unionists expressed their discontent at the headquarters of the ruling coalition parties, where their representatives met with the Liberal leader Ludovic Orban the leader of the USR-PLUS Alliance, Dan Barna. Their main demands are: a decent minimum wage, fair pensions, quality public services, unblocking collective bargaining, correct taxation and the correct application of legislation. According to Deputy Prime Minister Dan Barna, part of the demands could be resolved in the coming period, others must be considered in the context of an economy in crisis, which was generated by the Covid-19 pandemic and of a budget that should fall into the deficit of 7% of GDP.



    Washington – Washington has been closed down, today, ahead of the Democrat Joe Biden’s inauguration as the 46th President of the United States. 25,000 troops will be on the deserted streets this time, in a city marked by the new coronavirus pandemic and by the violent events that took place two weeks ago, when the Capitol was stormed by radical supporters of the incumbent Republican President Donald Trump. Attending the inauguration ceremony will be the former Presidents Barack Obama, Bill Clinton and George Walker Bush. Donald Trump will be the first incumbent president in 152 years that will not participate in the inauguration ceremony of his successor to the White House. After taking the presidential oath, Joe Biden will address a message of unity and healing to a deeply divided nation. Commentators say that no president in the modern history of the US has faced so many huge crises before taking office – the new coronavirus pandemic, economic emergencies, racial disputes and the challenge to try to unity a deeply divided nation, that could not agree on the candidate that won the presidential election. According to analysts, Joe Biden will try to mend his countrys international alliance system.



    Sibiu – The city of Sibiu, in central Romania, was nominated, for the second consecutive year, to the list of the best 20 European tourist destinations by the European Best Destinations Association. The competition for establishing the top will take place between January 20 and February 10. The city presentation highlighted the historical center, ways of spending time in the open, the region’s gastronomy and the trekking possibilities in the area. In 2020, Sibiu was ranked 6th, ahead of such destinations as Paris, Rome and Cork.



    Moldova – The President of the Republic of Moldova, Maia Sandu, was on a two-day visit to Brussels, where she had meetings with the heads of the main European institutions, as well as with members of the Unions executive and parliament. During the meetings, she highlighted the priorities of her mandate — especially fighting corruption, speeding up of access to the COVID-19 vaccine for doctors and front-line healthcare workers, stepping up economic cooperation, gaining support for farmers and small and medium-sized enterprises. According to Maia Sandu, the interest of the Republic of Moldova is to expand and deepen cooperation with the EU in several areas, including the foreign policy dimension, as well as in relation to the continuous integration in the economy, energy, environmental protection and services domains.



    ECHR – The European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) has condemned Romania for violating the right to private life, after the countrys authorities refused to recognize the change of sexual identity of two people because they had not undergone gender reassignment surgery – GRS. The two persons, of Romanian citizenship, aged 44 and 38, who are recorded in the civil status register as females, complained that the court rejected their requests to change their status because they did not provide evidence for GRS. According to the ECHR, the national courts placed the applicants, who did not want GRS, in a dead-end dilemma: either to undertake such surgery, against their own will, and giving up the full exercise of their right to have their physical integrity respected, or to give up their sexual identity, which is also related to the right to have one’s privacy respected. The ECHR also considered that the applicants had been placed in a situation of vulnerability, humiliation and anxiety.



    Handball – The Romanian womens handball champions, SCM Râmnicu Vâlcea (south), are taking on, today, at home, Buducnost Podgorica (Montenegro) in a remaining match from group B of the Champions League. In the first match, played two months ago, the Romanians lost to the Montenegrins, 28-29. On Sunday, they defeated, away from home, 27-25, the Croatian team Podravka, thus obtaining the first victory after six consecutive defeats. With two points, SCM is on the 6th place in the group. On top position is Györi Audi from Hungary. Also in the Champions League, CSM Bucharest, another Romanian womens handball team, is on 3rd position in Group A, dominated by Rostov Don from Russia. (tr. L. Simion)

  • January 8, 2021 UPDATE

    January 8, 2021 UPDATE

    COVID-19 The new coronavirus strain discovered in the UK, and which spreads more easily, has been confirmed in Romania, in a 27-year old woman, the Romanian Health Ministry announced on Friday. The patient, who has a mild form of the disease and is isolating at home, has not travelled abroad recently. Nearly 5,000 new COVID-19 cases were reported on Friday, many of them in the capital Bucharest. The total number of cases since the onset of the pandemic is over 660,000. 1,100 patients are in intensive care, and the death toll exceeds 16,500. The Romanian Health Minister plans to streamline procedures for the set-up and authorisation of COVID-19 vaccination centres. Minister Vlad Voiculescu announced the relevant legislation is being amended to this end. PM Florin Cîţu said in a post that Romanias vaccination capacity is growing from one day to the next, and explains the number of centres is soon expected to reach 1,000, with a combined capacity of 150,000 vaccine doses per day. So far over 92,000 people have received the vaccine in Romania.




    VACCINE The EU has signed a new deal with Pfizer/BioNTech for the purchase of another 300 million doses of anti-Covid vaccine, in addition to the 300 million already bought, said the head of the European Commission, Ursula von der Leyen quoted by DPA. According to the EU official, 75 million doses would be delivered in the second quarter of the year. The EU started rolling out the vaccine produced by the German-US consortium Pfizer-BioNTec in December. The EU has also approved the Moderna vaccine and is waiting for the delivery of the first 160 million doses. The European Commission has been criticised for the slow pace of the immunization campaign addressing its 450 million citizens.




    BUDGET The European Commission has again cautioned the centre-right government in Bucharest that it has to keep budget deficit in check, after expenditures soared in 2020 whereas incomes went down against the background of the health crisis. We are expecting a robust 2021 budget from Romania, the vice-president of the European Commission Valdis Dombrovskis said in a phone talk with the Romanian Finance Minister Alexandru Nazare. The Romanian official pledged that investments and EU fund absorption remain top priorities. Minister Nazare said Bucharest plans a gradual narrowing of the deficit starting this year, so that it may reach 3% of the GDP in 2024.




    TEEN PREGNANCIES Romania ranks 2nd in the EU by number of teenage births, which has serious consequences on teenage mothers as well as social and economic costs, according to a report released by UNICEF and SAMAS Association in Romania. Adolescent childbearing is recurring within families from one generation to the other, and is linked with poverty and with poor health services and social-economic status. According to the report, in 2019 Romania had nearly 17,000 teenage pregnancies. Recommendations include legislative and administrative reforms to remove barriers to underage access to reproductive health and information and the introduction of mandatory reproductive health classes in schools.




    SPORTS The womens handball side CSM Bucharest is playing on Saturday against the Hungarian team Ferencvaros, away from home, in the Champions League Group A. In the first leg of the round, the Romanians won 25-19. CSM Bucharest ranks 2nd in Group A with 11 points, with Ferencvaros coming 4th with 8 points. On Sunday, Romanian womens handball champions SCM Ramnicu Valcea, take on several times European champions Györ, in the competitions Group B. The Romanian team is 8th in the group, with no points after 5 games.




    US The outgoing US president Donald Trump announced on Friday that he will not take part in the inauguration of president-elect Joe Biden. Trump will be the second US president to decline attending his successors inauguration, after Andrew Johnson in 1869. The announcement came hours after Trump had promised a smooth transition for president-elect Joe Biden’s administration, in a video posted on Twitter where he said he was ‘outraged by the lawlessness, violence and mayhem’ caused by his supporters who stormed the US Capitol. In Congress, the Democrats called on Vice-president Mike Pence to use the 25th amendment to remove Trump in the wake of the violent events on January 6th, in which 5 people were killed. The US Capitols security chief and other members of his administration resigned following the riot, in order to protest the violence. (tr. A.M. Popescu)

  • American democracy is put to test

    American democracy is put to test

    Shocking
    images travelled around the world on Wednesday, when the US Capitol Building was
    taken by storm by Donald Trump supporters. Called upon to come to Washington and
    encouraged by the president himself, they absurdly tried to stop Congress from certifying the result of the presidential election, which
    they believe was rigged.




    The
    idea of the elections being stolen was in fact introduced to US public agenda
    and promoted by Trump himself before, during and after elections, without being
    able to provide any valid proof. Dozens of court cases brought by the
    Republicans were all dismissed and the Electoral College confirmed the victory
    of Democrat Joe Biden. Donald Trump ignored all these facts, becoming increasingly
    isolated even within his own party, with many Republican leaders acknowledging
    defeat. One such figure is vice-president Mike Pence, who was pressured by
    president Trump not to recognise Biden’s victory. Pence told those who wrought
    havoc in Congress that they did not win, that violence never wins, freedom does,
    while the leader of Senate Republicans Mitch McConnell described the riots as failed
    insurrection.




    The
    Senate’s top Democrat Chuck Schumer said Wednesday’s events did not happen spontaneously.
    He accused president Trump, who he said promoted conspiracy theories and motivated
    these thugs, of bearing much of the blame. The attack on the Capitol was also
    described as insurrection by president elect Joe Biden, who called on Donald
    Trump to step in firmly to stop the violence and protect the Constitution.




    On Wednesday, Trump posted several video
    messages on Twitter in which he thanked his supporters for their support,
    refusing to admit defeat and insisting that he won the elections and that his
    victory was stolen. He did tell protesters to go home, so as to have peace, law
    and order.




    Leaders
    from around the world have condemned the events in Washington. UN secretary-general
    Antonio Guterres said politicians must impart on their supporters the need to refrain
    from violence and respect democratic processes. EU foreign policy chief Josep
    Borrell and NATO secretary-general Jens Stoltenberg said the result of the
    elections won by Democrat Joe Biden must be respected. What happened in America
    is not American, said French president Emmanuel Macron, while British prime
    minister Boris Johnson described the scenes coming out of Washington as disgraceful.




    The
    Romanian foreign ministry said the violence that took place on Capitol Hill is
    worrying and unacceptable and expressed confidence in American democracy, which
    it said should remain a model for the entire world. (CM)

  • Romanian – US cooperation in the field of energy

    Romanian – US cooperation in the field of energy

    Romania has huge economic potential, and it is a very good place for investors, not only from the US, but from around the world, the US Ambassador to Romania Adrian Zuckerman said early this month, voicing hopes that the economic partnership between the 2 countries would catch up with and even outperform the military one.



    One of the key areas where Washington and Bucharest work together is the field of energy. In order to meet its energy security and decarbonisation goals, Romania intends to upgrade one of the reactors of the Cernavoda nuclear power plant and build another 2.



    The project is estimated to cost 8 billion US dollars, and the US Export-Import Bank will provide up to 7 billion USD for its funding. Once completed, the project will enable the Nuclear Power Plant in Cernavodă, south-eastern Romania, to cover around 40% of the countrys electricity needs. This is double the rate covered at present, says Cosmin Ghiţă, general manager of Nuclearelectrica:



    Cosmin Ghiţă: “With Units 3 and 4, this means doubling the current nuclear power capacity, and this is only one of the benefits. In Romania, the nuclear industry provides around 11,000 jobs. Once these projects are started, the number of jobs could reach over 20,000. As for the benefits of revamping Unit 1, these are evident: operating this facility for another 30 years, at less than half the cost of a new reactor.



    The agreement between Romania and the US on cooperation in the Cernavoda nuclear power projects was signed in Bucharest on Wednesday by the Romanian economy minister Virgil Popescu and the US ambassador, in the presence of the interim PM Nicolae Ciucă.



    The terms of the documents had been agreed on in early October, during the economy ministers visit to the US, when the memorandum of agreement with Exim Bank was also signed.



    This week, the USA Exim Bank president Kimberly Reed went to Cernavodă, and in a subsequent meeting with minister Virgil Popescu, he emphasised that the institution is ready to provide funding to Bucharest for other projects as well. The US might also fund the development of natural gas in the Black Sea.



    Romgaz is currently negotiating the acquisition of the US company Exxons stake in the Neptun Deep offshore project, and once investments in the Black Sea are restarted, Romania may become Europes largest natural gas and energy producer.



    Ambassador Adrian Zuckerman, attending the meeting, emphasised the importance of Romania securing its energy independence and added that the visit made by the Exim Bank president highlights the US commitment to Romania. (tr. A.M. Popescu)

  • High-level Mandate

    High-level Mandate

    Against the background of the deepest division in Americas recent history, according to analysts, voters queued at polling stations in the United States – the country most affected by the coronavirus pandemic. More than 99 million Americans voted in advance, either in person or by mail, and the total number of those who expressed their political choice exceeded the 138 million votes won by the Republican Donald Trump in 2016. Challenged by the incumbent president, Democrat Joe Bidens victory is set to be confirmed in the middle of next month, with the electors vote, but the implications of the change of guard at the White House are already under the analysts scrutiny.



    Romanian political analyst Andrei Taranu talked on Radio Romania about the potential relaxation under the Biden administration: “Internally, in the United States, there will probably be an attempt to de-escalate the huge division that exists in American society and to try and resolve the tensions of a racial, social nature, related for example to the health care and education systems. Externally, it is still not very clear what to expect. Certainly, transatlantic relationships will improve, but we dont know how much. I think that the relationship with Romania is an already cemented relationship. I dont think bad things can happen to Romania, and good things are probably already unfolding. The Department of State, through the voice of the United States Ambassador to Bucharest, has said that there will be some massive US investments in transport, communications and roads infrastructure. And, from my point of view, the security policy of the United States will not change fundamentally. “



    According to university professor Dan Dungaciu, to Donald Trump, everything that happened in the three decades before 2016 was a weakening of the USA. Thats why, during his term, Trump has focused on a more inward-looking America, which does not consume its resources abroad, and from this perspective he has changed almost radically the paradigm of Americas functioning at global level.




    “Donald Trumps thesis on international relations was that for 30 years America spent trillions, trillions of dollars to be defeated, without victory in Afghanistan, without victory in the Middle East, and with the exception of Eastern and Central European states, it did not managed to attract almost anyone from the wake of the Euro-Atlantic world. The world built by America for 30 years, from Trumps perspective, was a world that drained America of resources, failed to resolve conflicts in the world, and, moreover, allowed Americas enemies to grow and develop. It is interesting to see if Bidens America returns to the pre -Trump paradigm and resumes its foreign policy vision, in which the world turns into America and America becomes the liberal hegemon that has been for 30 years. What Biden will do from this perspective is interesting to watch, but from my point of view, America will not return to the period before Trump, we will witness an America that will no longer be interested in many of the issues that are fundamental to us, as Europeans.”



    China is Americas rival and even its opponent on various issues – this is the Washington consensus between Democrats and Republicans, verbalised differently at the public level, and from this point of view nothing major will change, says Professor Dungaciu, according to whom the coming world order will build around this relationship between America and China.



    “This will be the equation through which we will have to read the world and depending on it, we will relate to the strategic and even economic reality of the world to come. As for the relationship with the Russian Federation, it will be read also in the framework of the relationship with China. The Russian Federation is today in the situation China was in the 1970s. At that time the great confrontation was between America and the USSR. China played between America and the USSR. Russia is now in a situation where it is a third party in the battle between the big guys. The Russian Federation will be very careful not to make decisive gestures either in relation to China or in relation to America, which would be perceived as an absolute alliance, and from this perspective, we should expect a diplomatic game of the Russian Federation, starting from the hypothesis that it is no longer a great world player, but it can play its chances or maximize its smaller chances that it still, at least theoretically, has. This is the context in which the Russian Federation will count, just how the European Union will count, also as a minor player with regard to the dispute between America and China. A player that China, by no coincidence, is courting with much more diligence on the economic level of their bilateral relationship. “



    According to Associate Professor Valentin Naumescu, there will a Trump legacy beyond his presidential term. He also be lives that the Biden administration stands all the good chances of rendering the relations between the US and the EU normal, and that is probably one of the most important immediate consequences of the US election:



    “This, Id dare say, the main benefit for Europe and even for the region that we are in, for the Central and Eastern Europe, because our interest is NATO, the alliance that provides the security guarantees that Romania and Europe in general need. It all depends on the quality, strength and credibility of the transatlantic relations, and these very relations have been seriously affected in the past 4 years. There are things that are hard to fix, that take time, and others that will no longer go back to where they started from.”



    Unavoidably, Professor Naumescu believes, certain political accents, concerns, some protectionist tendencies, either economically or with regard to winning global supremacy will continue and will be taken over by the next administration. (M. Ignatescu)

  • US Election Day

    US Election Day

    Polling stations are closing across the US in the presidential election that pitted Republican Donald Trump against Democrat Joe Biden.



    Although Biden was ahead at national level, polls were close in key swing states, including Florida, Arizona, and Georgia, making the outcome unpredictable. Florida is projected to have been won by Donald Trump, but the race is too tight to call in many of the other battleground states.



    The campaign was held amid the COVID-19 pandemic, the handling of which was one of the major issues over which the 2 contenders diverged. But even so, the turnout was among the highest in the past century, with an unprecedented 100 million people casting their ballots early or by mail.



    Mail-in and early votes also play a part in how soon the final result will be known, as some states allow ballots arriving after Election Day to be counted—provided they are postmarked by November 3.



    Also, given the electoral college system used by the US, where winning the most votes does not necessarily mean winning the election, both opinion polls and exit polls may prove misleading and Americans may still have to wait days before they know who their president will be for the next 4 years.



    The Congress line-up was also at stake on Tuesday, with the Democrats seeking control over the Senate in addition to their current majority in the House.