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RADOR: News from Romania, 98-07-29
July 29, 1998
CONTENTS
[01] President Emil Constantinescu on a Visit to Turkey
[02] President Constantinescu's Statement;
[03] A US Presidential Adviser about President Constantinescu's Recent
Visit to the US;
[04] Romanian Defence Minister on a Two-Day Visit to FYROM;
[05] Romanian Foreign Minister to Visit Albania and Macedonia;
[06] Reactions to Recent Remarks by Presidential Adviser Zoe Petre
Concerning the Setting Up of a Hungarian Language Teaching University;
[07] Romanian-Italian Military Cooperation;
[08] Romanian Industry and Trade Minister on a Visit to Jiu Valley;
[09] General Strike in Transports Expected.
[01] President Emil Constantinescu on a visit to Turkey
After the meeting between Turkish President Suleyman Demirel and his
Romanian counterpart Emil Constantinescu on Tuesday, the Turkish president
told a press conference that previous agreements between the two countries
were about to show their first results as the Turkish-Romanian cooperation
on political, cultural and defence matters was extremely good. Supporting
his statement, Mr Demirel mentioned the 700 million dollar Turkish
businesses in Romania and the 500 million dollar Turkish investments, and
more, he said that trade and business between Turkey and Romania might hit
1 billion dollars by the end of the year. In his turn, President
Constantinescu said that Romanian-Turkish relations were an example for the
countries in the region as all economic, diplomatic and political
initiatives had now concrete results. The Romanian president then reviwed
the main topics under discussion between the two sides: nuclear cooperation,
oil processing, developing railway facilities, cooperation on third markets
in Central Asia and Bosnia and Herzegovina. Turkey has reiterated its
support for Romania's NATO integration and expressed its concern about
recent tensions in the Yugoslav Kosovo province. The Government in Ankara
has asked for a multinational peace-keeping force in the Balkans and the
officials in Bucharest shared the idea. RADOR
[02] President Constantinescu's statement
Romanian President Emil Constantinescu has returned from Turkey yesterday
around midnight. While still at the airport, the Romanian president told
journalists that his visit focused mainly on issues concerning the economic
cooperation between the two countries and expressed the hope that the
Romania-Turkish economic trade would hit 1 billion dollar by the end of the
year. Referring to the Kosovo crisis, the president said that both Romania
and Turkey shared similar opinions over the matter. Romania supports the
Turkish initiative of delivering humanitarian aid for the people in the
conflict areas, the president added. RADOR
[03] A US presidential adviser about President Constantinescu's recent
visit to the US
"The visit of the Romanian head of state to Washington have secured the
existing good relations already established last June when President
Clinton came to Bucharest. After their recent talks, the relations between
the two presidents became even more friendly and led to a better
undersanding and agreement on matters of regional interest and on the steps
Romania had to make towards its Euro-Atlantic integration", US Presidential
Security Councellor Stephen Flanagan said in an interview. He mentioned
that President Constantinescu's speech before the US Congress has been
"very impressive". "President Constantinescu said Romania was making big
efforts to prove it was a viable NATO candidate", Mr Flanagan said but he
stopped however short of mentioning any date for the event. RADOR
[04] Romanian defence minister on a two-day visit to FYROM
While on a two-day visit to FYROM, Romanian Defence Minister Victor Babiuc
has signed on Tuesday a military cooperation agreement along with his
Macedonian counterpart Lazar Kitanovski. According to the same source, the
Romanian minister said after the ceremony that "the two countries expressed
their will to cooperate" as "we both share similar interests. Our talks
were an opportunity to review the fields our cooperation might concentrate
and, in this respect, we discussed issues concerning recent developments in
the region, and the Kosovo crisis in the first place". The Romanian
minister pointed out that cooperation between the two ministries should
continue and extend to other levels according to recent developments in the
region. "Romania and Macedonia are real pillars of stability in South-East
Europe, they are going the same positive way and other states in the region
may follow their example", Macedonian Defence Minister Lazar Kitanovski
admitted. RADOR
The Romanian defence minister met Macedonian President Kiro Gligorov on
Tuesday. The Macedonian president has expressed his support for developing
relation between the two countries while mentioning the historical
tradition and the Macedo-Romanian community in Macedonia. As the situation
in Kosovo seems still tense, the Romanian and Macedonian ministers disagree
with the Western attitude of wating for things to happen. On the contrary,
the two ministers believe that the situation may grow even serious unless a
solution is found. Mr Babiuc said that, as long as the Western states were
still waiting, Yugoslavia's neighbouring countries had "nothing much left
to do". RADOR
[05] Romanian foreign minister to visit Albania and Macedonia
Romanian Foreign Minister Andrei Plesu is expected to pay a two-day visit
to Albania and Macedonia between July 29-30. The agenda of the visit
includes meetings with Albanian President Rexhep Mejdani and Macedonian
President Kiro Gligorov as well as meetings with the prime ministers and
the foreign ministers of both Albania and Macedonia. According to a
communique issued in Bucharest, the talks will focus mainly on recent
developments in the Kosovo-Metohija crisis. RADOR
[06] Reactions to recent remarkss by presidential adviser Zoe Petre
concerning the setting up of a Hungarian language teaching university
Presidential adviser Zoe Petre has attended the seminar in Tusnad on
"National State, Political Nation and National Policy". During the talks
over the issue concerning the setting up of a Hungarian language teaching
university, Mrs Petre said that "as long as the Hungarian minority's demand
was persistently made, the answer to it might eliminate some of the
aggressive speeches". The position is quite ambiguous as it is seemingly
rather supporting the setting up of a Hungarian university while, at the
same time, warning about attempts of both Romanian and Hungarian hard-line
rhetoric to keep up. Mrs Petre's intervention has angered all the
nationalist parties such as the Greater Romania Party (PRM), the Romanians'
Unity Party (PUNR), the Party of Social Democracy in Romania (PDSR) and the
Alliance for Romania Party (ApR). They have all accused Mrs Petre of
exceeding responsibilities and some of them even called for her resignation
while two Romanian daily newspapers - "Adevarul" and "Cotidianul" -
launched fierceful attacks against the presidential adviser. When asked if
she believed the setting up of a Hungarian language teaching university was
possible, Mrs Zoe Petre replied: "I don't see why not. I know there are
opinions for and against that idea, but we must see if the opinions against
it are enough evidence to oppose the will of people representing 7% of
Romania's population". RADOR
[07] Romanian-Italian military cooperation
A military delegation of the Romanian Army's General Staff of Land Troops
is to visit the Artillery School at Bresciano, Italy, between July 29 -
August 3. According to a Romanian National Defence Ministry (MApN)
communique, the Romanian and Italian officers are expected to share some of
their experience in training exercises including artillery shooting during
a fight. RADOR
[08] Romanian industry and trade minister on a visit to Jiu Valley
While visiting the Copper Autonomous Utility in Deva on Tuesday, Romanian
Industry and Trade Minister Radu Berceanu had talks with trade union
leaders and management representatives on issues concerning the
restructuring of the institution and ways of turning it into a national
company. Mr Berceanu said the law on special areas was withdrawn from
parliament and an ordinance on the issue is expected to operate during the
summertime and allow an accurate picture of the disfavoured areas in the
country, mainly the mining areas. Minister Berceanu then went to the mining
branch of Brad for similar talks with trade unionists down there. RADOR
[09] General strike in transports expected
After the breakdown of negotiations on Monday between government officials
and transport trade unionists, the trade union leaders have warned that the
National College of Transporters might decide a general strike on August 4 -
the biggest since 1990 - unless another round of negotiations would take
place this week in order to discuss the trade unionists' demands. The
strike is expected to start simultaneously and it may include all workers
in air, water and land transports. The METROREX trade unionists demand a
new contract recognising professional diseases while those of the SNCFR
(the Romanian Railways) demand indexations which the transport minister and
the SNCFR executives claim as impossible. RADOR
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