The liberal coalition government led by Romanian prime minister-designate Calin Popescu Tariceanu won a vote of confidence on Tuesday night from both houses of Parliament.
The premier and his 24-member Cabinet won the approval of 265 members of the Senate and the Chamber of Deputies against 200 "no" votes. Four deputies did not vote. In a statement of his government's policy, Tariceanu said its priority would be to implement a flat tax of 16 percent for income and profit and emphasized that the transition from communism to capitalism was over.
He said his government would concentrate on integration with the EU with membership expected in 2007, the depoliticization of the judicial system, independence for the formerly state-controlled press, the removal of the government from the economy and the fight against poverty.
Tariceanu, chairman of the National Liberal Party, heads a coalition of four parties after parliamentary elections on Nov. 28.
Tariceanu's party holds eight cabinet positions, including the key portfolios of defense, finance and the general secretariat. The Democratic Party has six, the Democratic Union of Hungarians in Romania four and the Humanist Party three.
Of the 24 ministers, 11 are under 40.
Under Tariceanu's tax plan, tax on business profit would be reduced from 25 percent and employee and social benefits paid by employers would be reduced from 49.5 percent to 39.5 percent.
The collapse of the Swiss Birch glacier serves as a chilling warning of the escalating dangers faced by communities worldwide living under the shadow of fragile ice, particularly in Asia, experts said. Footage of the collapse on Wednesday showed a huge cloud of ice and rubble hurtling down the mountainside into the hamlet of Blatten. Swiss Development Cooperation disaster risk reduction adviser Ali Neumann said that while the role of climate change in the case of Blatten “still needs to be investigated,” the wider impacts were clear on the cryosphere — the part of the world covered by frozen water. “Climate change and
Poland is set to hold a presidential runoff election today between two candidates offering starkly different visions for the country’s future. The winner would succeed Polish President Andrzej Duda, a conservative who is finishing his second and final term. The outcome would determine whether Poland embraces a nationalist populist trajectory or pivots more fully toward liberal, pro-European policies. An exit poll by Ipsos would be released when polls close today at 9pm local time, with a margin of error of plus or minus 2 percentage points. Final results are expected tomorrow. Whoever wins can be expected to either help or hinder the
DENIAL: Musk said that the ‘New York Times was lying their ass off,’ after it reported he used so much drugs that he developed bladder problems Elon Musk on Saturday denied a report that he used ketamine and other drugs extensively last year on the US presidential campaign trail. The New York Times on Friday reported that the billionaire adviser to US President Donald Trump used so much ketamine, a powerful anesthetic, that he developed bladder problems. The newspaper said the world’s richest person also took ecstasy and mushrooms, and traveled with a pill box last year, adding that it was not known whether Musk also took drugs while heading the so-called US Department of Government Efficiency (DOGE) after Trump took power in January. In a
It turns out that looming collision between our Milky Way and Andromeda galaxies might not happen after all. Astronomers on Monday said that the probability of the two spiral galaxies colliding is less than previously thought, with a 50-50 chance within the next 10 billion years. That is essentially a coin flip, but still better odds than previous estimates and farther out in time. “As it stands, proclamations of the impending demise of our galaxy seem greatly exaggerated,” the Finnish-led team wrote in a study appearing in Nature Astronomy. While good news for the Milky Way galaxy, the latest forecast might be moot
RSS