A painful reality. Why half of Romanians fail to pass the 8th grade ●Head of “Criminal Investigations” Braille, psychologically unfit ●Behind the scenes of the appearance of the Spare Book in Romania. Exceptional security measures implemented by the publisher ●How DNA caught two Italians trading car rights that had to be “manufactured” at a policeman’s home ●Who benefited from keeping the side effects of the anti-covid vaccine a secret? ●Why PNL drags Lucian Bode into the plagiarism scandal ●Monica Belucescu, an architect from Germany: A foreigner will not respect us if we do not respect ourselves ●“If I had a penny for every misogynistic comment I heard at school, I’d buy a new phone” ●Armand Gochut: Ukraine, too difficult an exam for the elite from Bucharest ●Jonuts Dumitru, on the decision of the BNR: The effects will be reduced, even minimal

A painful reality. Why half of Romanians fail to pass the 8th grade

According to the partial results of last year’s census, more than 40% of Romanians did not pass the 8th grade, if they ever did. The reason: although we live in the 11th century and are a member of the European Union, it is almost impossible for young people in rural areas to go to secondary school. Consequences: poor economic results, write the Truth.

Head of “Criminal Investigations” Braille, psychologically unfit

The final verdict in the case of Police Commissioner Marian Merlan, the officer in charge of the criminal investigation service – the most important structure in the district police inspectorate.

The officer did not pass the psychological test that precedes the competition for the position, but remained dissatisfied with this decision and filed an appeal.

Thus, the appeal commission of the Psychosociological Center of the Ministry of Internal Affairs rejected the appeal as “groundless”. writes Debrăila.ro

Behind the scenes of the appearance in Romania of the book Spare/Rezerva, Prince Harry’s memoirs. Exceptional security measures introduced by Nemira publishing house.

For the Romanian edition of the reserve/reserve book, there were 4 translators (Carmen Neatsu, Cristina Nan, Oana Jonascu, Smaranda Nistor) who translated different segments due to security reasons, so that no one would have the full picture, and because it consisted of a large number of pages ( over 400), which had to be translated very quickly.

The book was published at the Monitorul Oficial printing house, which could provide special security conditions, the same regime as for publishing bulletins: no employee entered with luggage, there were video cameras.

The Romanian translation was ready on December 15, when the printing and recording of the audiobook began. It was again recorded in the studio under maximum security, the text was read from the cloud, without an actor reading (Aleksandr Ungura) or anyone from the studio – being able to leave the studio with fragments of what was written, writes Urban.ro

How DNA caught two Italians trading car rights that had to be “manufactured” at a policeman’s home

Last year, a neighbor of an Italian living in Bucharest complained to him that he could not legally obtain a driver’s license because he had been convicted of a traffic violation. The Italian rushed to help his neighbor, telling him that through a fellow citizen he could get a car license from an officer of the Permits Office – DRPCIV Bucharest.

The Italian promised to get permission in 4-5 days, without the “beneficiary” going through court procedures. Initially, the Italian asked for 1,000 euros for this “service”, but later increased the amount to 12,000 euros. However, two Italians were caught red-handed by DNA. One has already been given a final sentence, and the other is awaiting resolution, as the court rejected a plea agreement made with the prosecutor’s office, writes Just.ro

The NBR increases the interest rate of the monetary policy. Why 0.25% is a compromise interest

At the first monetary policy meeting this year, the National Bank raised the interest rate by 25 basis points to 7%. Some banking analysts had expected the central bank not to raise the rate, which reached 6.75% after eight hikes last year.

The central bank is raising its key interest rate to curb inflation. Every time the NBR raises interest rates, banks follow suit and raise interest rates on both loans and deposits to stem credit consumption and encourage savings. Commercial banks are also expected to raise interest rates in line with the NBR, according to the RFI

Who benefited from keeping the side effects of the anti-covid vaccine a secret?

Data from an undated report withheld by the authorities may explain the failure of the Covid vaccination campaign in Romania and why the conspirators were more successful in their propaganda than the officials. Bohdan Oprya, a former spokesman for the Ministry of Health, told Libertatea that he cannot forget how Valeriu Giorgice, who coordinated the entire anti-covid offensive, “got angry when I publicly reported from the Ministry of Health the first case of an adverse effect – a woman with facial paresis Georgytse said it was a panic attack, but we had a diagnosis on the table with the initials of a neurologist.” according to the materials of DW

Why PNL drags Lucian Bode into the plagiarism scandal

The interior minister has a lot of influence in the PNL, the party that will be affected by the Lucian Bode plagiarism scandal. Two experts consulted by “Free Europe” explain how important Bode’s post of general secretary in the PNL is for Romanian parties.

Experts in the field of political communication commented for Free Europe on the appearance of scores, with which party members are determined to attack journalist Emilia Serkan. The document was first published by Hotnews, writes Free Europe.

Will President Iohannis be able to see his soul child, “Educated Romania”, going to school in 2024?

The extremely controversial bill that Sorin Kimpeanu left after his resignation from the ministry is expected to be improved and revised, if not in essential parts, then at least in those that caused public scandals, and takes into account some criticism from civil society and educators.

One of the big question marks regarding the education law, which is the backbone of the president’s “Educated Romania” project, is whether it will be able to be implemented in the next academic year, i.e. 2023-2024. More precisely, if President Klaus Iohannis can see his soul child in school for the rest of his mandate.

As the possible chronology shows, this does not bode well, writes Free Europe.

Monica Belucescu, an architect from Germany: A foreigner will not respect us if we do not respect ourselves

Monica Belucescu currently lives in Germany and Spain. He was born in Bucharest, where he studied architecture. When he came into the “field of work,” design, at ICRAL, he recalls that the director would start his speech at every meeting with the words, “Design is a joke!”, regardless of the topic of the meeting.

Monica and her colleagues were young, they had fun then. But they never forgot how they started their career as architects in communist Romania.

He survived the 1977 earthquake, counting and describing the enormous damage in Bucharest. “From March to autumn, I worked in the field, on damage assessment,” she says in the next interview, “it was the most depressing period, contact with the plight of people affected by the disaster.” Then another “earthquake” happened, the one that distorted the face of Bucharest: the People’s House.Read the article on PressHub

“If I had a penny for every misogynistic comment I heard at school, I’d buy a new phone.” Young women who bring feminism to the province

“It seems unfair to me that my cousin can go out in the evening and stay as long as he wants because he is a boy,” says Anda Ducescu, a teenager from Slatina. “The conductor made some colleagues ‘panarams’ because they had pink hair,” Carla Pantillier, a high school student from Campina, gives another example. Both girls illustrate the perceptions of their communities. They coordinate F-SIDES feminist film clubs in their cities and try to continue the discussion of gender equality among colleagues and teachers. For them, it is a victory when guys come to their sessions, even if they are brought by their girlfriends, Scoala9.ro writes

Armand Gochut: Ukraine, too difficult an exam for the elite from Bucharest

Among NATO and EU countries, Ukraine has the longest border with Romania – 613.9 km. In second place after Romania is Poland with 542.39 km. In fact, Poland, Slovakia, and Hungary together have 777.94 km of borders with Ukraine.

Among its NATO and EU neighbors, Romania is located closest to the main theaters of military operations in 2022 – Kherson and Donbass. And in the future, Romania is the closest NATO country to the main fronts in 2023, i.e. Crimea, Kherson, Zaporizhzhia, Donetsk and Luhansk.

Perhaps it is still too early to talk about the consequences for Romania of Russia’s aggression against Ukraine. They depend on how this war ends. In the event of Ukraine’s defeat, Romania will be part of a chain of Central European states on the front line, called to defend the Euro-Atlantic world, writes PressHub

Jonuts Dumitru, Raiffeisen Bank, on today’s BNR decision: Consequences will be reduced, even minimal

The consequences of today’s decision of the Central Bank will be reduced, I would even say minimal. In the context, where at the moment the situation with liquidity in the money market is more important. The situation improved significantly at the end of last year (in November and December) when the finance minister poured a lot of money into the money market due to a very large budget deficit.

“The interest, if we look at ROBOR, has been on a downward trend over the last period: from over 8%, we are currently at around 7.5%. Interest rates have probably peaked. To the extent that inflation begins a downward trajectory, and interest rates will continue to decrease, first capping and then decreasing,” says Ionut Dumitru, Chief Economist of Raiffeisen Bank, quoted by Bankingnews.ro