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Good news for the Buhusi brown bears, Orange, Dacia and Roger Federer; bad news for Russian stock investors and sumo wrestling - in Vivid's regular roundup of news stories from Romania and abroad

Posted: 11/09/2008

At home

Sergeant Dragos Traian Alexandrescu became the 7th Romanian victim of the US-led occupation in Afghanistan; Romania currently has 760 military personnel in Afghanistan. Central bank governor Mugur Isarescu said that if inflation and the current account deficit were reduced then the country would be on track to adopt the euro in 2014. Romtelecom was awarded the sixth mobile telephone operator's license. The last of the brown bears held at the notorious Buhusi zoo were transported to a WSPA sanctuary at Zarnesti, near Brasov, and a lion, nine cubs and a tiger were flown from the decrepit Braila zoo to a wildlife reserve in South Africa. Attila Korody, the Environment Minister, attended a rally to protest against hunting in national parks. Romania's President Traian Basescu met Pope Benedict XVI during an official visit to Italy, and extended an invitation to the Pope to visit Bucharest in 2009. Mr Basescu then visited South Korea. Defence Minister Teodor Melescanu visited Greece. Posta Romana is to replace all its mailboxes by the beginning of next year. Orange unveiled the iPhone in Romania. Dacia said that it had sold more than 28,000 vehicles in France since the beginning of 2008. Bentley opened a dealership in Bucharest. A survey conducted by the European Foundation for Better Working Conditions, an organisation set up by the EU, showed that Romanians and Bulgarians worked the most hours in a week, 41.7, of any other European workforce. Ilarion Ciobanu, the actor, died, aged 76. Razvan Krivach won this year's top prize at the Cerbul de Aur music festival in Brasov for a song called, "Too Much Love Will Kill You." Romania finished in overall 17th place at the Beijing Olympics, which included four gold medals, won by Sandra Izbasa in the floor gymnastics exercise, Constantina Tomescu in the marathon, Alina Dumitru in the 48kg category in judo, and Georgeta Damian-Andrunache and Viorica Susanu in the women's coxless pair rowing. Romania lost 0-3 to Lithuania in a World Cup qualifier in Cluj, but beat Faroe islands 1-0 in Torshavn. Romania finished fourth overall in the inaugural Prague Cricket Cup; Prakash Pushpakaranvimala won the trophy for the best batsman of the tournament.

Abroad

Their conventions over and nominees confirmed, Democrats and Republicans set about campaigning for the US presidential elections, to be held on 4th November. The outgoing President George W Bush announced that 8,000 American troops would come home from Iraq, where there are currently 146,000, and an extra 4,500 would be deployed to Afghanistan, which this year has experienced a 50 per cent rise in insurgent attacks, and where there are currently 33,000 troops. The Bush administration claims the withdrawal is an indication of an easing in tension as a result of last year's troop "surge" in Iraq; the Iraqi Prime Minister Nouri Maliki said that he had tentatively agreed with the US military that it would withdraw by 2011. Prime Minister Asif Ali Zidari, the widower of former prime minister Benazir Bhutto won a sweeping victory in Pakistan's presidential election, which followed the resignation of Pervez Musharraf, the country's head of state since 1999. Yasuo Fukuda, the prime minister of Japan, resigned, blaming obstruction from the opposition. A court ordered that Thailand's Samak Sundaravej should resign after admitting to receiving payments for his appearances on a televised cookery show that he has hosted for seven years. The ruling MPLA party won a landslide victory in Angola's first parliamentary elections in 16 years. Canada's Prime Minister Stephen Harper called a snap election in a bid to strengthen his minority conservative government. The US Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice flew to Libya for landmark talks with its president, Colonel Muammar Gaddafi. More than 5,000 police were deployed at a football match in the Armenian capital of Yerevan, attended by the Turkish President Abdullah Gul; it was the first time a Turkish leader had been to Armenia. Magomed Yevlovev, a journalist and critic of the Putin regime in the Kremlin, was shot dead. The world's largest cattle ranch, Anna Creek Station in South Australia, sold all its cattle because of the severe drought that is gripping much of Australia. The US government said it would purchase the two mortgage financing companies, Fannie Mae and Freddie Mac; at a cost of as much as $200 billion, it will be America's largest corporate rescue. The Moscow stock exchange fell by more than 30 per cent following Russia's invasion of Georgia. A truck driver in England was sentenced to four years in prison for causing a fatal crash whilst talking on a Bluetooth headset. Thomas J Bata, who ran the Bata shoe empire in the second half of the twentieth century, died, aged 93. Isaac Hayes, the singer and songwriter, died, aged 65. President Levy Mwanawasa of Zambia died, aged 59. Alexander Solzhenitsyn, one of the greatest Russian writers of the twentieth century, died, aged 89. The stars of the Beijing Olympics included the Jamaican sprinter Usain Bolt, who set new world records in the 100 metre, 200 metre, and 4x100 metre relay events, and the American swimmer Michael Phelps, who won an unprecedented eight gold medals. A resurgent Roger Federer and Serena Williams won the men's and women's singles titles at the US Open tennis tournament. Lance Armstrong, who won the Tour de France seven times, announced that he would come out of retirement to attempt to win an eighth and raise awareness of cancer. The chairman of the Sumo Association, Kitanoumi, resigned following the revelation that two sumo wrestlers were given lifetime bans after testing positive for marijuana use.

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