Romanian President Traian Basescu met the heads of diplomatic missions to Bucharest on Thursday. In his first speech since demonstrations against him and the government started in Romania last week, he said nothing about the protests but focused on the country's international affairs priorities. "2011 was a difficult year in which the economic, financial, humanitarian and sometimes political crises challenged governments and the people", he said.

Romanian President Traian Basescu said on Friday that a Dutch decision to oppose Romania' and Bulgaria's Schengen accession was an "abuse". "Romania has Albita [Eastern border point], they have Rotterdam. The gate for trafficked cigarettes, alcohol and drugs is not Albita", the Romanian head of state said in Brussels, where he attends the European Council.

The most important thing in Cuba is still the necessity to find ways to survive, mostly by taking part in illegal activities ranging from corruption through sex trafficking to various kinds of illicit deeds not thought of by even the most experienced observers.

Cuban workers are virtually defenseless. The reason is that the labour law offices in Cuban work centres, which are supposed to defend worker's rights, are but an extended arm of the government and the Communist Party.

Romania and Israel are interested in developing joint infrastructure, energy and agricultural projects, Romanian PM Emil Boc said in a press conference with his counterpart Benjamin Netanyahu on Thursday, on the margins of an inter-governmental meeting in Jerusalem. Iran, Middle East relations and links between Israel and Romania featured prominently during the talks.

Libya, Afghanistan and the missile defense shield were the key issues covered in top NATO and Romanian officials at the Alliance's Parliamentary Assembly on Monday. While Europe had strong military forces, the gap between the US and its allies has widened for the past years and in Libya, European allies and Canada had most troops contributions but based their activities on US command capacities and essential units, said NATO Secretary General Anders Fogh Rasmussen. On the missile defense, Romanian President Traian Basescu said for his part that his country has never asked for or received anti-missile guarantees from anybody and had an obligation to obtain them by themselves through partnerships with allies.

The Republic of Moldova has a strategic interest in the AGRI project due to bring natural gas from Azerbaijan via Georgia to Romania, Moldova prime minister said in an interview with HotNews.ro. He also said that early elections would be catastrophic for his country, 5+2 negotiations over Transdniester and dismissed the possibility to bring the communists in the Moldovan government.

Spoken by spouses, by relatives, by children barely recalling their mother of father who died ten years ago, the names of the thousands of victims of the 9/11 terrorists attacks are the many names of America today. They are the names of America because America has shown again, by remembering the most grievous of tragedies in its recent history, that it knows to honor its dead, average people or heroes with impressive stories. They are the names of America because the force of this nation consists, among others, of the miraculous gift of no-names to give birth to heroes any given time. They are the names of America, those who united a whole nation these days in a very special effort of mindfulness: by properly honoring the past, their eyes on tomorrow.

​Romania recognizes the National Transitional Council in Libya as the sole official contact in relations with Lybia, president Traian Basescu has said at the annual reunion of Romanian diplomats, news agency Agerpres reports.

Romanian news agency Agerpres, quoted by Evenimentul Zilei newspaper, reports that Russia's Ambassador to NATO Dmitri Rogozin warned on Sunday about the risk of fascism emergence in Europe considering the Norway attacks. In this context, he recalled a recent statement made by Romanian president Traian Basescu According to whom he would have sent Romanian troops across Prut river in 1941 just like wartime Romanian leader Marshal Antonescu did at the time.

The Ambassador of France to Bucharest, Henri Paul, has told in an interview with news agency Mediafax that he had the "same feeling" as the US Ambassador when French business people came to him and told him about corruption in Romania. Asked whether the business people were demanded bribes in Romania, he answered "Yes". He said in the same interview with Mediafax that the end of 2012 was the best Romania can hope for when it comes to a moment for its accession to Schengen.

Bulgaria created a ministry in 2010 to deal exclusively with the seven operational programs funded by the EU. In an interview with hotNews.ro, Bulgarian minister Tomislav Donchev, 38, tells how his ministry managed to absorb five times more European funds in one year than in the period of 2007-2009. He says European Commission officials need to know that there is a strong political personality in the country to be responsible with European money.

Romanian President Traian Basescu received European Commissioner Neelie Kroes in Bucharest on Monday. He used the occasion to note that Romania adopted necessary measures to combat the economic crisis a year before other countries but that fact was not acknowledged by anybody for the time being.

Romania is renegotiating its convention with the Russian Federation signed in Moscow in 1996, according to data provided by the Economy Ministry in Romania at HotNews.ro request. The convention is important as it reffers to the quantity of Russian natural gas delivered to Romania and the transit to third countries. A major change to the convention would be the introduction of the right to resell gas delivered by Russia for Romanian consumers to other states. Also subject of renegotiation are the quantities of gas Gazprom will export to Romania, which may reach 10 billion cubic meters by 2020.

A 33 year old Romanian was sentenced to four years of prison by a court in Illinois for being part of a network convincing users of some websites like eBay or Craiglist to send money in exchange of fictive products. The Romanian pleaded guilty in February but prosecutors said that he admitted he opened accounts in five different American states to submit the money obtained by fraud.

The Greek Parliament voted on Wednesday the austerity budget for five years, in the context of the violent outbreak on the streets of the capital city, Reuters informs. PM George Papandreou committed before the vote to do anything to avoid a default.

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.

Two of the killers of the Romanian handball player Marian Cozma, violently stabbed to death in Veszprem, Sandor Raffael and Gyozo Nemeth were sentenced to prison for life and third accused, Ivan Sztojka was sentenced to 20 years of prison, Hungarian press reports.

The richest citizen of the Bulgarian city Ruse who won last year about 1.6 million euro is a Romanian citizen, the Bulgarian fiscal administration announced quoted by Novinite. The man, whose name has not been revealed, would have been attracted to Bulgaria by the low level of taxes maintained by the government at the level before the crisis.

Dorin Chirtoaca obtained a new mandate as Mayor of Chisinau according to the official data released by the Central Electoral Committee. Thus, after counting 100% of the votes, the Liberal candidate Dorin Chirtoaca received 50.6% of the cast votes while his opponent Igor Dodon receive 49.4% of the votes. According to Unimedia.md, Dodon won over 50% of the votes in the capital city but Chirtoaca was favored among the suburbs. The victory will be officially confirmed today in a press conference at the Central Electoral Committee