Iohannis: I have invited Estonia to join the Euro-Atlantic Resilience Centre

Romania's President Klaus Iohannis announced on Wednesday having invited Estonia to join the Euro-Atlantic Resilience Centre in Bucharest. "Romania and Estonia share common visions and interests at the EU level, which facilitates close co-operation between us on the current European agenda and the European Union's priorities in the future. After today's meeting, I am convinced that we will continue to support the importance of a uniform approach at the European Union, in full consistency with the principles of solidarity, cohesion, fundamental values, including in the recent debates at the conference on the future of the union. We also discussed the importance of coordination at EU level in promoting resilience both internally and globally. I emphasised that, especially in the light of the lessons learned from the experience of the recent crisis, it is essential that we take action to strengthen the European Union's capacity to respond effectively to any potential new challenges. The Euro-Atlantic Resilience Centre in Bucharest will be very useful to that end, and I invited Estonia to join in," the Romanian head of state told a joint news conference in Tallinn with his Estonian counterpart Kersti Kaljulaid. He said that their talks focused on the possibilities of strengthening Romanian-Estonian co-operation in the areas of digital, cyber security and artificial intelligence, given the experience in this area of Estonia and Romania, which hosts the new European Union cyber centre. Iohannis added that their talks also focused on the results of the recent NATO summit on June 14. "We welcomed the decision to develop a new NATO strategic concept, as well as the decisions taken at the summit on strengthening NATO's political and military stance, including on the Eastern Flank," Iohannis also said. Discussions between the two officials also focused on regional co-operation under the Three Seas Initiative. "The Three Seas initiative can contribute to the economic recovery in the post-pandemic period by developing connectivity between the countries in the region. In fact, a main objective of Romania remains the implementation of the strategic interconnection projects Rail-2-Sea and Via Carpathia. At the same time, we voiced support for a successful incoming meeting next month in Sofia, Bulgaria," said Iohannis. The two presidents also addressed recent developments in the Eastern Neighbourhood. "We discussed the situation in Moldova and voiced the support of Romania and Estonia for the resumption of the ambitious agenda of pro-European democratic reforms of Moldova. We also discussed the worrying security situation around Ukraine, as well as the growing serious challenges related to Belarus. All these issues are also relevant from the perspective of the forthcoming European Council of June 25, when we return with a more strategic discussion on the EU's relationship with Russia. We agreed to coordinate for the best possible preparation for the forthcoming Eastern Partnership summit, which must aim for the most ambitious results both in terms of the overall vision and actual objectives pursued jointly with the Eastern partners," said Iohannis, commending Estonia for constantly supporting Romania's opening membership discussions with the Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development (OECD). President Klaus Iohannis on Wednesday started a two-day state visit to Estonia. AGERPRES (RO - author: Florentina Peia, editor: Florin Marin; EN - author: Corneliu-Aurelian Colceriu, editor: Adina Panaitescu)   Photo source: presidency.ro