Victor Ponta

With one month to go before European elections in Romania, the candidates of 15 parties and alliances and eight independent candidates are gearing up to compete for the elections on 25 May.

Romania will have 32 seats in the future European Parliament, compared to 33 at present.

Romania's Senate voted Tuesday to approve a draft law providing EUR 100 M of financial aid to the Republic of Moldova.

“Romania is my country, Chevron will never poison it,” was one of the slogans chanted by protesters who rallied in Pungesti, a village in eastern Romania on Tuesday, who also booed US company officials and journalists when they entered the site where Chevron is to start exploration for shale gas.

Romania's government plans to increase its defense budget over possible tensions on its eastern borders with Ukraine.

Prime Minister Victor Ponta announced plans for defense expenditures, which currently amount to 1.36% of GDP to reach 2% by 2017.

Romanian Prime Minister Victor Ponta said on Wednesday that the country needed to spend more on the armed forces.

Gabriel Resources is to axe 373 jobs, around 80 per cent of its workforce in Romania, citing “unjustifiably long delays” in the approval of the gold mining project at Rosia Montana, in central Transylvania.

Romania's excise on fuel, gas and tobacco has come into force, in compliance with an agreement that Bucharest struck with the IMF.

From Monday, fuel prices in Romania will increase with EUR 0.07 per liter, a pack of cigarettes will go up by EUR 0.6 to EUR per liter, and gas will be 2% more expensive for consumers Dnevnik.bg has reported.

Romanian Prime Minister Victor Ponta has said his centre-left government will not revoke a controversial fuel tax coming into force on April 1, but promised compensatory measures.

“The measure will help ‘fair' transporters, without a history of tax evasion, who will be able to recover most of the costs [of the new tax],” Ponta said, without offering further details.

Romania's President Traian Basescu asked Prime Minister Victor Ponta to revoke a fuel excise coming into force on April 1.

In a letter, Basescu wrote that introducing the excise would "put an exaggerated and pointless pressure on the economic environment and on the consumers," as Romania's AGERPRES quoted him as saying.

Romanian officials on Tuesday expressed support for the government of neighbouring Moldova and urged Russia not to encourage separatists in Moldova's Transdniester region in their quest to join Russia.

“Romania together with its EU and NATO partners should show their commitment to supporting Moldova’s independence and territorial integrity,” Romanian Prime Minister Victor Ponta said.