Romanian PM, president to visit Germany, Iohannis to meet Merkel

Romanian prime minister Dacian Ciolos and president Klaus Iohannis will visit Germany in the upcoming period, the PM announced. While the PM will travel next week to three lands in Germany to meet with representatives of local businesses, the Romanian president will meet German Chancellor Angela Merkel.

According to the PM, he will travel to Germany, to Bavaria, Baden Wurttemberg and North Rhine-Westphalia to meet with Bavarian companies that already invested in Romania, or which are interested to do so in the future. “Our relation with Germany is proceeding in a dynamic way, not only at political level, but also at an economic one,” the PM told Radio Romania Actualitati.

The PM also announced that President Klaus Iohannis will meet with German Chancellor Angela Merkel. The meeting comes amid initiatives by Romania, alongside other Eastern European states, to become a more important actor in the decision-making process.

“This is what we want to do now with Poland and other partners, to prepare ideas, not only to participate in these debates, to prepare and to put ideas on the table, topics of compromise on the main subjects connected to the negotiations of the UK’s exit from the European Union that are under discussion,” Ciolos said.

“Certainly”, the future European budget, the future of the main EU community policies will be discussed and we want to come up together with ideas and proposals. Romania will also be part of this consultation process, including with Germany,” Ciolos added.

According to Ciolos, the Romanian president will have a meeting with Germany’s Chancellor Angela Merkel and Romania will see a visit by French president Francois Hollande, prior to the upcoming European summit in Bratislava. The EU Summit will take place in the capital of Slovakia on September 16 and will host talks on the future of EU, post Brexit.

“We will have again a talk with France on these main points on the agenda. I met with Poland’s PM. So we are in a very dynamic process of consultations,” Ciolos said. According to the Romanian PM, he would like the Bucharest-Warsaw axis to become even more dynamic.

“The so-called Bucharest-Warsaw axis, that I would like to become more dynamic in the upcoming years” Ciolos said, adding that, “regardless of who is governing in Poland or in Romania, it is not just a counterweight to the old Europe, but it aims to be a way of balancing things in the EU,” Ciolos added.

“We do not want to deepen the rift between the old and new Europe, but to find ways to discuss and to be part of the decision-making process on equal footing,” Ciolos explained. Referring to a meeting with Angela Merkel earlier this year, Ciolos said : ”nobody is preventing you from being an active part of this process, but this implies that you should be more active, more dynamic,” the head of Romanian government said.