Romania to boost defence spending this year

Reuters    Translate This Article
28 April 2014

BUCHAREST, (Reuters) - Romania will raise the defence ministry's 2014 budget by 700 million lei ($217.41 million), or 0.2 percent of national output, Prime Minister Victor Ponta said on Monday.

The announcement comes as tensions continue to build in neighbouring Ukraine after Russia's annexation of Crimea.

Romania has agreed a fiscal budget deficit target of 2.2 percent of gross domestic product this year under the terms of a 4 billion euros aid deal led by the International Monetary Fund.

Higher defence spending would raise the ceiling, as would government plans to slash employer taxes to the social insurance budget. An IMF mission is expected in Bucharest later this year.

'We will supplement this year's defence ministry budget ... by roughly 700 million lei, or 0.2 percent of GDP,' Ponta told reporters. He added troops will get better technical equipment, with upgrades done mostly in Romanian defence plants.

The European Union state's defence budget is currently at a little over 1 percent of GDP.

Romania's leftist government approved a plan last year to buy second-hand F-16 fighter jets from Portugal to bring its air force up to NATO standards.

Along with neighbouring Bulgaria, Romania joined NATO in 2004 and has been part of Washington's military operations in Iraq and Afghanistan. It is in the process of phasing out its outdated Soviet-made MiG-21s.

($1 = 3.2197 Romanian lei)

(Reporting by Luiza Ilie Editing by Jeremy Gaunt.)

Copyright © 2014 Reuters

Reuters content is the intellectual property of Thomson Reuters or its third party content providers. Any copying, republication or redistribution of Reuters content, including by framing or similar means, is expressly prohibited without the prior written consent of Thomson Reuters. Thomson Reuters shall not be liable for any errors or delays in content, or for any actions taken in reliance thereon. 'Reuters' and the Reuters Logo are trademarks of Thomson Reuters and its affiliated companies. For additional information on other Reuters media services please visit reuters.com/newsagency.

Global Good News comment:

Maharishi's Vedic Approach can solve the problems reflected in the above article and in all areas of life: agriculture, business, culture, education, government, and world peace. For more information please visit:
http://maharishi-programmes.globalgoodnews.com/



Translation software is not perfect; however if you would like to try it, you can translate this page using:

(Google) Select a language English to Afrikaans English to Albanian English to Arabic English to Belarusian English to Bulgarian English to Catalan English to Chinese (Simplified) English to Chinese (Traditional) English to Croatian English to Czech English to Danish English to Dutch English to Estonian English to Filipino English to Finnish English to French English to Galician English to German English to Greek English to Hebrew English to Hindi English to Hungarian English to Icelandic English to Indonesian English to Irish English to Italian English to Japanese English to Korean English to Latvian English to Lithuanian English to Macedonian English to Malay English to Maltese English to Norwegian English to Persian English to Polish English to Portuguese English to Romanian English to Russian English to Serbian English to Slovak English to Slovenian English to Spanish English to Swahili English to Swedish English to Thai English to Turkish English to Ukrainian English to Vietnamese English to Welsh English to Yiddish

(Altavista babelfish) Select a languageEnglish to Chinese-simpEnglish to Chinese-tradEnglish to DutchEnglish to PortugueseEnglish to FrenchEnglish to GermanEnglish to GreekEnglish to ItalianEnglish to JapaneseEnglish to KoreanEnglish to RussianEnglish to Spanish