Professor Daniel Daianu was invited in the last days to be part of the European Foreign Relations Councils, a European think tank that reunites about 140 prominent persons from politics and business. The European organization is the equivalent of the Council for European Relations in New York. read more...

President Traian Basescu declared on Tuesday after a meeting with the Greek President that Greece is the fifth investor in Romania in the banking sector, food sector, telecommunications and others. All the seven banks that operate on the Romanian market have a good behavior and do well and honest, Basescu said. read more...

Streets filled up with garbage, garbage blocks on main roads, lack of hot running water, lack of sewages – this is how Bucharest looks like according to VerticalNews.com quoted by Tourism-review.com. Bucharest was voted the ugliest EU city capital. There are no paved streets, drinking tap water, sewages and in some places in Bucharest it feels like the Middle Ages. There are houses with clean tap water but they have no sewage. read more...

Google launched on Monday in Romania the Map Navigation service, a free application that works on all cells with a GPS chip and Android operating system. The new service will be available on all cells that have versions from 1.6 to 2.3 and will use the internet connection of smartphones to download the latest maps. read more...

The abdication of King Michael was a tragic episode in our history, Romania’s Foreign Affairs minister Teodor Baconschi said in a Hotnews.ro – RFI talk show with Dan Tapalaga. Baconschi said that any historical evaluation should normally be done in an urban climate. read more...

President Basescu addresses the Parliament on matters of internal politics, news agency Agerpres informs. The chief of state said that he believed it was necessary to address the Parliament to underline some o the elements proposed for the revision of the Constitution. read more...

IMF board will hold on Monday the first evaluation meeting of the new stand by agreement with Romania according to the program released by the institution, news agency Agerpres reads. read more...

Unemployment rate, according to the International Labour Office was 7.6% in the first quarter of the year compared to the 7.3% registered in the previous quarter but it registered a decrease compared to the 2010 first quarter when unemployment was 8.1%, the National Statistics Institute reads. The highest unemployment rate, of 23.6% was registered among young people ages 15 to 24. read more...

Chinese Ambassador to Bucharest, H.E. Liu Zengwen said that Chinese businessmen are interested to invest in the road infrastructure in Romania, including in highways but big investments need to be assured with state warrantees, news agency Mediafax reports. read more...

The EU gave Croatia a green light to join the European Union, as it approved the end of adhesion negotiations with Zagreb that started five years ago, AFP informs. The adhesion treaty will be signed by the end of this year according to the text of the document adopted on Friday at Brussels and Croatia will become a member on July 1, 2013. read more...

US Ambassador to Bucharest, H.E. Mark Gitenstein explained in a statement for HotNews.ro his reasons for criticizing, the other days, the decision of the Constitutional Court on the project revising the Constitution proposed by President Basescu. Romania offers opportunities but as long as there is corruption and no rule of law, American investors will not invest in Romania, Gitenstein said for HotNews.ro. read more...

The potential withdrawal of Greek banks from Romania would not pose such a big problem for the local banking sector because authorities have the necessary resources to takeover the branches and sell them later to other financial groups and the National Central Bank can face the shocks, a report of the financial institution JPMorgan Chase Bank reads, quoted by news agency Mediafax. read more...

The European Parliament decided to waive the immunity of the Romanian MEP Adrian Severin, involved in a scandal of money for amendments in the European Parliament. European Parliamentarians voted on Thursday the report of the Judicial Committee of the Parliament that recommends the EP to waive the immunity of Adrian Severin. read more...

President Traian Basescu will attends, on Thursday and Friday the Sumer European Council meeting. The agenda includes subjects like the economic problematic, immigration, consolidating Schengen and the negotiations of Croatia to join the EU and the evolutions in the South vecinity of the EU. read more...

The European Bank for Reconstruction and Development and IFC, part of the World Bank will offer a 114.8 million euro loan to finance some wind parks in Romania developed by the Portuguese company EDP Renovaveis according to Bloomberg.com. Each of the two financial institutions offers 57.4 million euro to Cernavoda Power SA, a company owned by EDP Renovaveis. read more...

Romanian, Bulgarian and Greek leaders should allow foreign experts to manage EU funds, German MEP Jorgo Chatzimarkakis declared for Euractiv. All these countries are very proud saying that this measure would affect their sovereignty, Chatzimarkakis said. read more...

Anything is possible, Hungarian Democrat leader Kelemen Hunor said when he was asked whether his party might exit the governing coalition if an agreement on the two parties is not reached over the territorial reorganization issue. We do not accept the 8 region proposal and we are seeking a middle ground but we did not find it yet, Hunor said. read more...

One of the themes of the last months is related to Greece’s situation and the way its situation might affect the rest of the European economies. Romania’s representative to the IMF, Mihai Tanasescu talked with HotNews.ro about the impact of Greece over the Romanian economy. read more...

US Ambassador to Bucharest, H.E. Mark Gitenstein said that the decision of the Romanian Constitutional Court on the constitutionality of the proposals to modify the constitution are worrisome because it stalls the efforts to consolidate justice and fight against corruption in Romania, a press release of the Embassy reads. read more...

Romanian Justice minister Catalin Predoiu met his Moldovan counterpart, Oleg Efrim at Bucharest and offered the support of the Romanian party for European integration and a strategy developing the judiciary, news agency Agerpres reads. read more...