President Klaus Iohannis has received on Wednesday, at the Cotroceni Palace, his Portuguese counterpart, Anibal Cavaco Silva, who is on a state visit to Romania. Iohannis told the join press conference that Romania intends to become an exporter of energy security in the region, while the Portuguese companies have already expressed their will to invest in our country.
“The dynamics of the Romanian-Portuguese relations have significantly increased in the past years and we wanted to mark this at the highest level. We discussed about our bilateral relations, about the partnership within EU and NATO, but also about the challenges of the current geopolitical background,” Romanian President stated.
He added that Portugal is a very important partner for Romania, this being particularly reflected in the business and defence sectors.
“Romania intends to become an exporter of energy security in the region, and Portuguese companies have already expressed their willingness to invest in this sector,” he said.
Iohannis also pointed out that the two countries agreed to continue cooperation in the political and defence field, reminding that the partnership included so far several projects within Smart Defence initiative, as well as the European air transport Fleet program. At the same time, Romania bought F16 multirole fighters from Portugal in 2013.
Iohannis mentioned that the Romanian community living in Portugal, which counts over 40,000 Romanians, is also playing an important part in enhancing bilateral relations. “We can say it represents a communication bridge between our countries,” the Romanian president said.
According to the Presidential Administration, Klaus Iohannis signed the decoration order for the Portuguese counterpart. Aníbal Cavaco Silva received the National Order “Star of Romania”, Romania’s highest civil order.
The Portuguese president’s visit to Bucharest also occasioned initialling of a cooperation program on culture, education, sports and tourism, signed by the president of the Romanian Cultural Institute, Radu Boroianu and the president of Camoes-the Institute for Portuguese Cooperation and Language, Ana Paula Laborinho.
The program will enable teaching Romanian language, literature, culture in Portugal and vice versa, scholarship grant, validation of studies, information exchanges on education, scientific and technological cooperation, cultural exchanges on fields such as dance, music, theater, cinema, plastic arts, television interpretations support, sports and youth cooperation and general provisions on touristic cooperation.
Iohannis pleads for harmonization between president’s and premier’s going in for foreign policy
Questioned by a Portuguese journalist to comment on PM Ponta’s escape in Baku, President Iohannis said a harmonization procedure is needed among the Presidency’ s and the prime minister’s way of going in for foreign policy.
“I assure you that Romania’s foreign policy will be coherent from now on, we know very well who are our friends. There is no danger in the way that Romania is treating its friends and partners,” Iohannis answered.
In his turn, asked how the “political crisis” in Romania will affect the trade bilateral relations, the Portuguese president said that a head of state visiting a country does not comment on the domestic problems of that country.