April 20, 2016 UPDATE
Click here for a roundup of domestic and international news
Newsroom, 20.04.2016, 12:30
The Romanian community is an example of
integration and participation in Spain’s social and economic life, the Spanish
Justice Minister Rafael Catala Polo said in Bucharest on Wednesday during the
meeting he had with his Romanian counterpart, Raluca Pruna. According to the
Spanish official one million Romanians is currently living in Spain. He
described as good the cooperation with the Romanian authorities in the field of
justice, at the bilateral level and in the relations with the EU. According to
Rafael Catala Polo the fight against organized crime, corruption as well as the efforts
aimed at improving the legal system are taking place concurrently in both
countries, Spain and Romania.
The first talks held in Brussels on
Wednesday after a two years break between NATO countries and Russia were
sincere and serious but failed to solve divergences on several issues such as
the Ukrainian crisis, NATO secretary general Jens Stoltenberg explained. NATO
has suspended cooperation with Moscow to protest Russia’s annexation of Crimea
and the advance of the pro-Russia separatists in eastern Ukraine in the spring
of 2014. The North-Atlantic Alliance has accused Russia of destabilizing
Ukraine by funding the separatists.
The National Liberal Party (PNL), Romania’s main right-wing
political party, on Wednesday decided to withdraw Marian Munteanu from the race
for Bucharest’s mayor seat. Munteanu has been replaced with Catalin Predoiu,
interim president of the PNL’s Bucharest branch. Marian Munteanu, a leader of
the students’ movement and symbol of the 1990s is the third candidate the PNL
has so far renounced only a week after being nominated. His nomination
attracted a lot of heat from civil society; several NGOs called for his
withdrawal after having described him incompatible with European and Democratic
values. The first PNL candidate Ludovic Orban withdrew after having been placed
under investigation for using influence with a view to obtaining undue
benefits. We recall that Romania will be hosting local elections on June 5th.
The
President of Ukraine, Petro Poroshenko, will be on an official visit to Romania
on Thursday. He will have meetings in Bucharest with his Romanian counterpart
Klaus Iohannis and with PM Dacian Cioloş. In February, the two presidents had a
meeting on the sidelines of the Munich International Security Conference. The
talks highlighted the progress made in several bilateral areas and the
willingness of both sides to make headway in implementing the ongoing joint
projects. The last high-level meeting took place on March 17, 2015, when Klaus
Iohannis traveled to Kiev.
Romania’s former right-wing president, Traian Băsescu, has been charged with a
continuing offence of money laundering in a case prosecuted by the Office of
the Prosecutor General. According to judicial sources, the case is related to
land transactions in the Bucharest area. In 2000, when he was mayor general of
Bucharest, Traian Băsescu
purchased a substantially under-priced plot of land, which he subsequently sold
for a lot more money. The
ex-president confirmed, on his Facebook account, that he had been notified by
the Prosecutor General of his being a suspect in a money laundering case. He
mentioned however that in 2012 the criminal charges against him had been
dropped. The case was re-opened in 2015.
