Foreign relations

The Council today asked the Commission to submit a study on the Aarhus Convention. The aim of the Aarhus Convention is to guarantee access to information, public participation in decision-making and access to justice in environmental matters. The EU and its member states are fully committed to the Convention and its objectives.

The interior ministers of the Salzburg Forum member states adopted a joint declaration on security priorities at the end of a ministerial conference held in Bucharest on Thursday and Friday.

Forty-four members of the US Congress, including Greek-Americans Gus Bilirakis of the Republican party and John Sarbanes for the Democrats, have written a letter to Defense Secretary James Mattis urging him to cancel the planned delivery of more than 100 F-35 fighter jets to Turkey.

Interior Minister Carmen Dan met on Friday, on the sidelines of the ministerial meeting of the Salzburg Forum (SF), with executive director of Europol Catherine de Bolle. The discussions focused on Romania's contribution to the functioning of this European agency.

Greek Cypriots started work on June 8 on building what has been billed as the largest casino resort in Europe costing 550 million euros ($650 million) and creating thousands of jobs on the south of the holiday island.    

On 7 June 2018, the Council (at ambassadors' level) confirmed the agreement reached between the Bulgarian presidency and the Parliament on new rules on using criminal law to counter money laundering. The new directive aims at disrupting and blocking access by criminals to  financial resources, including those used for terrorist activities. 

AGERPRES special correspondent Floreantina Peia reports:

President Klaus Iohannis discussed on Thursday with his Polish counterpart Andrzej Duda about the summit of the Three Seas Initiative that will be organised in September in Bucharest.

France, Britain, Germany and the EU sent the United States on June 6 a joint official request for their companies to be exempt from punitive measures resulting from fresh U.S. sanctions on Iran.

Romania's President Klaus Iohannis on Thursday will visit Poland at the invitation of his Polish counterpart to co-chair a Bucharest B9 Summit (B9) together with Poland's President Andrzej Duda.

French automaker PSA said on June 4 that it would pull out of two joint ventures to sell its cars in Iran to avoid the risk of U.S. sanctions after Washington withdrew from a key nuclear deal with Tehran.