This is the zero issue of Romanian Dispatch, a weekly English-language newsletter, and soon also a podcast, about developments in Romania — from politics to pop culture.
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The body of Gholamreza Mansouri, a former judge wanted on corruption charges, will be returned from Romania to Iran once coronavirus restrictions have been lifted, Abbas Mousavi, the spokesman for Iran’s foreign ministry announced in a press conference on July 13.
Iran has urged the Romanian government to clarify the cause of death of Gholamreza Mansouri, the former judge who was found dead at a Bucharest hotel on Friday, June 19.
New facts have emerged surrounding the death of the former judge Gholamreza Mansouri, whose body was found in a Bucharest hotel last Friday, June 19. Shortly before the fall inside Hotel Duke, Mansouri had paid for his accommodation and packed his bags, say sources close to the team of investigators. Among his personal belongings, the police found several mobile phones and SIM cards, local media reported.
Today the Bucharest police homicide department continues its investigation into the death of Gholamreza Mansouri, the former judge who was found dead in a Bucharest hotel on the afternoon of Friday, June 19. As part of suspicions surrounding Mansouri’s death, questions have arisen about possible political bias in the investigation, as both Romanian authorities and the Iranian foreign ministry immediately assumed Mansouri committed suicide.
Former judge Gholamreza Mansouri was found dead in a Bucharest hotel, where he was waiting for a decision on his extradition from Romania. He reportedly jumped or was thrown from the hotel’s fifth floor.
Honderd jaar nadat Transsylvanië aan Roemeens grondgebied werd toegevoegd, is de herinnering aan “Trianon” nog altijd levend in Roemenië. Het land heeft sinds vorige maand maar liefst twee nationale feestdagen om dit voor Roemenen heugelijke feit te vieren. Op 1 december staan ze op de Nationale Dag (Ziua Națională) – ook wel Grote Unie Dag (Ziua Marii Uniri) – stil bij de unificatie van de Roemeense provincies Wallachije, Moldavië en Transsylvanië. Op 13 mei jongstleden nam het parlement een wet aan die van 4 juni de Dag van het Verdrag van Trianon maakt.
After twenty years of growth, labor shortages threaten to derail the economies of Central and Eastern Europe. Since the Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, and Slovakia joined the EU in 2004, followed by Bulgaria and Romania in 2007, their economies have been boosted through a combination of capital from multinationals and cheap and well-educated local workers.
2018 ended on a high note: the gender gap in Romania continues to close. According to new figures from the renowned World Economic Forum, Romania has closed the overall gender gap to slightly more than 71%, which places Romania 63rdin the global ranking, just behind Croatia (59), Kazakhstan (60) and Bosnia and Herzegovina (62) but quite far behind our neighbours Bulgaria (18), Moldova (35) and Serbia (38).
A new report on how EU member states address the legacy of the Holocaust claims that several Central and East European countries are seeing widespread historical revisionism and are downplaying of World War II crimes. The report was published two days before January 27, International Holocaust Remembrance Day, which marks the anniversary of the liberation of Nazi Germany’s most notorious death camp, Auschwitz-Birkenau, where hundreds of thousands of Jews were murdered.
