Romania and the situation in Ukraine

There is no need for Romania to raise its level of alert, as there is no danger of an imminent conflict with Russia, said President Traian Basescu talking about the situation generated by the conflict in neighboring Ukraine.

Romania has reiterated its support for Ukraine’s independence, territorial integrity and sovereignty.

“Romania believes that the presence of Russian troops on Ukrainian soil, without that country’s approval and outside the scope of the bilateral agreements in force, is an aggression towards Ukraine. We appreciate that the Ukrainian troops decided not to respond to provocations, thus avoiding an escalation of the situation. We believe the Crimean Parliament’s initiative to adopt a declaration of independence from Ukraine, in the run up to the referendum set on March 16th, is illegitimate” Traian Basescu said.

To Romania, the referendum on the annexation of the autonomous region of Crimea to Russia, is unconstitutional.

Moreover, Bucharest has announced it will join the Euro-Atlantic attempts to restore the rule of law.

Actually, Romania has volunteered to participate in negotiations if need may be.

“If somebody needs the expertise of a neighbor who knows the regional situation pretty well, we have offered to be part of a potential negotiation format, but, from both a legal and moral point of view, we believe that the US and Great Britain, as signatories to the Memorandum of Budapest, should be on the front line of negotiations and that’s exactly what they are doing” the Romanian President said.

In 1994, Ukraine accepted to give up on its nuclear armament in exchange for the US’s, Great Britain’s and Russia’s guaranteeing its territorial integrity.

That is why Russia’s annexing Crimea would have serious consequences, as Romanian MEP Ioan Mircea Pascu said in Strasbourg.

“If Russia gets Crimea, other countries will think twice before giving up their nuclear arsenals, and that would have a negative point of view with regard to nonproliferation. And also, and this is probably the most important thing, the entire European security system would fall and it would have to be renegotiated, but this time with a much more aggressive Russia” Ioan Mircea Pascu said.

Also dangerous would be the emergence of a new frozen conflict in the Black Sea area and a regional destabilization.

“We could not anticipate Georgia. Ukraine caught us off guard. It would be ridiculous if something happened in the Republic of Moldova and we would be, again, caught by surprise, as Romania has been warning its allies about such dangers for quite some time now” President Traian Basescu said.

Against this background, the Romanian army carries on its drills and training programs.

The Chief of Staff has been ordered to move all drills planned for the second half of the year to the first half.

Also, Romania has put its air space to the disposal of NATO’s recon planes and has authorized the presence of a French frigate in the Romanian territorial waters.