Biro Rozalia, at Polish Economic Forum: We need to develop Carpathians brand

Hungarian Democratic Union of Romania (UDMR) deputy Biro Rozalia, chairman of the Foreign Policy Committee of the Chamber of Deputies, said on Monday that he has recently proposed the establishment of a Carpathian Mountains brand at the Economic Forum in Karpacz, Poland. "I mentioned in this conference that, in addition to the development of the infrastructure, through the large Via Carpatia and Rail-2-Sea projects, we need to develop a Carpathian brand, that should not only belong to Romania, but to all countries that have the Carpathian Mountains in their geographical area. The Carpathians brand should be developed in such a way as to preserve the cultural identity, traditions and specifics of each country, but, on the other hand, we should rely not only on a parliamentary and governmental level, but also on an initiative of the the private, civil sector, in order to develop a mentality of the citizens of the Carpathians and we should be proud of the natural wealth we have," Biro Rozalia told a press conference. The economic forum, which has been held in Poland for 30 years, took place on September 6-8 in the city of Karpacz, with the participation of around 3,000 parliamentarians in hundreds of panels. Discussions were held on a wide range of topics such as: Young Citizens for the Future of Europe, New Challenges in International Politics, the United States - Europe - Russia - China or The Parliamentary Diplomacy of the Three Seas. From the delegation of the six Romanian parliamentarians, Deputy Biro participated in the discussions on the Three Seas Initiative and the related projects, several panels on this initiative being organized by the Polish hosts. The deputy brought to mind that the Three Seas Initiative includes 12 states, supported by the United States, Germany and the European Commission, with the aim of creating and strengthening a collaboration platform to increase connectivity, especially along the north-south axis, in the Central and Eastern Europe region, in the fields of transport, energy and digitalisation. "We believe that once connectivity in these three areas is strengthened between the 12 participating countries, it will also ensure a strengthening of cohesion and convergence within the European Union. In my view, this cooperation is an opportunity for deeper economic cooperation in economy, in developing a cross-border infrastructure and thus a much stronger cross-border and regional cooperation," said Biro Rozalia. For Romania, she said, the two major projects, Via Carpatia and Rail-2-Sea are essential for this initiative, but also "to expand this collaboration and support the European path of the Republic of Moldova, Ukraine and Georgia''. The Rail-2-Sea project will ensure rail transport, with dual civil-military use between the port of Gdansk and the port of Constanta, which means a total length of about 2,600 kilometers, starting from Poland, through Slovakia, Hungary and Romania. There will be three corridors on our country's territory that will be built as follows: the first route, by 2022, the second, by 2029, and the the third by 2025, said Biro Rozalia. AGERPRES (RO - author: Eugenia Pasca, editor: Georgiana Tanasescu; EN - author: Simona Iacob, editor: Razvan-Adrian Pandea)