Dancila: Austrian Chancellor's visit, important moment, marking EU Council Presidency handover from Austria to Romania

The Austrian Chancellor's visit to Romania is an important moment, symbolically marking the handover of the Presidency of the EU Council from the Austrian Government to the Government of Romania and the transition from a protected Europe - the motto of the Austrian Presidency - to a Europe in which cohesion is seen as a common value, said Prime Minister Viorica Dancila.

"We are enjoying the presence of Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz today in Bucharest. This is all the more important as it marks the handover of the Presidency of the Council of the EU from the Austrian Government to the Government of Romania, a symbolic handover, because, as you know, the Austrian Presidency ends on December 31, 2018. This is all the more important as the Estonia-Bulgaria-Austria trio will end, Austria being the last state of this trio, and starting January 1, the Romania-Finland-Croatia trio begins, with Romania being the first state of this trio. We discussed about the Presidency of the Council of the European Union, about the important files on the European agenda, about the smooth transition from the Presidency held by Austria to the Presidency of Romania," Viorica Dancila said at Victoria Governmental Palace on Friday, during the joint statements alongside Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz.

The Romanian prime minister brought to mind that during the Austrian Presidency of the EU Council, Romania held the shadow presidency and the government ministers participated in the trio's meetings on the important files on the EU table.

The prime minister mentioned that each minister of her cabinet will take from his/her counterpart the files that will remain during the presidency that Romania is to hold.

The Romanian prime minister said that the talks also addressed the cooperation between Romania and Austria.

"We want cooperation, a bilateral relationship, a better economic and trade relationship, we have proposed a sectoral cooperation between our ministries. We have ministries cooperating very well. The Ministry of Public Finance has a very good cooperation with our counterpart in Austria. We also have other ministries who have a very good cooperation, but there are also areas like IT or research where we need to make further efforts to improve cooperation between the two countries. Today, the presence of the Austrian Chancellor in Bucharest is an important moment, it is a moment that I can say marks the start of a very important period for Romania, the first time when Romania holds the rotating presidency of the EU. I want to congratulate the Chancellor for the Presidency, for the results they obtained, for the approach manner, for the manner of addressing the main challenges at European level, and I am convinced, as I have mentioned, in fact, that, given the level of training that the Romanian Government has, the way in which we treated the takeover of the Presidency will make Romania a successful Presidency," Dancila said. AGERPRES (RO - author: Daniel Florea, editor: Mihai Simionescu; EN - author: Adina Panaitescu, editor: Cristina Zaharia)