NEWS OF THE DAY - JUNE 4

Prime Minister Victor Ponta has announced he will be meeting visiting US Secretary of Defence Chuck Hagel on Thursday. 'Yes, I will meet him and the message to be conveyed is the same I conveyed to US Vice-President Biden that Romania is a very serious and important ally to the US, to the Euro-Atlantic community. Romania has met all its obligations and is a stability factor in its region,' Ponta said Wednesday at Parliament Palace. US Secretary of Defence Chuck Hagel is expected on a visit to Romania at the invitation of his Romanian counterpart Mircea Dusa.

* Romania's GDP rose by 3.8 percent in the first quarter of 2014 compared with the same quarter of 2013, this being the largest annual advance recorded by a EU member state, according to the second estimate for Q1, 2014, published by Eurostat, the statistical office of the EU, on Wednesday.

* Romania has not fulfilled two of the five nominal convergence criteria for adopting euro, namely those regarding inflation and exchange rate, but it fulfilled those regarding budget deficit, public debt and long-term interest rates, the Convergence Report published on Wednesday by the European Commission shows.

* The National Statistics Institute (INS) confirmed the data regarding Romania's economic growth in the first three months of this year, i.e. 3.8 percent compared to the same period of 2013, and 0.1 percent when compared to the last quarter of 2013, the industry having the biggest contribution, of 2.3 percent to the GDP increase, according to figures released by INS on Wednesday. The most important contributions for raising the GDP in Q1, 2014 compared to Q1, 2013 came from all economy sectors, except for constructions, financial intermediation activities, insurance and...