Greek Prime Minister Alexis Tsipras (L) and Romanian Prime Minister Viorica Dancila attend a news conference in Bucharest, Romania, March 29, 2019. The governments of Romania and Greece agreed Friday on an action plan reflecting the priorities of the bilateral agenda that establishes a clear long-term cooperation strategy between the two countries in all areas, Romanian Prime Minister Viorica Dancila said. (Xinhua/Cristian Cristel)
BUCHAREST, March 29 (Xinhua) -- The governments of Romania and Greece on Friday agreed on an action plan reflecting the priorities of the bilateral agenda that establishes a clear long-term co-operation strategy between the two countries in all areas of activity, Romanian Prime Minister Viorica Dancila said.
"I had a consistent and extremely useful meeting today with my Greek counterpart, Alexis Tsipras, followed by a first Romanian-Greek intergovernmental meeting," Dancila told a join news conference with Tsipras, adding that the two met to analyse developments in strategic areas such as transport and energy security and to identify new opportunities in areas with a direct impact on economic development such as trade, agriculture, tourism, culture and education.
"As far as transport sector is concerned, we discussed our cooperation in major road and rail interconnection projects and we highlighted the importance of these projects for the integrated economic development of our countries," she said.
Talking about the energy security, Dancila emphasized the importance of the BRUA interconnection project, the first diversification project in southern Europe linking Bulgaria, Romania, Hungary and Austria that has the potential to provide a new route and natural gas sources of to a number of European countries in a major dependence on a single external supplier.
"We are continuing to advance with the BRUA corridor," said Dancila.
"What we need to understand in an era where everything happens very fast and the energy map modifies depending on the new challenges in front of us is that both Greece and Romania remain stability poles in the region, in terms of both economic cooperation and security," said the Greek prime minister in his turn.
"Greece and Romania have the strongest economies in the Balkans... our collaboration, always based on a very tight cultural tradition, plays a special role in the stability and development of the entire region," Tsipras stressed, adding that Greece overcame the crisis and it is looking forward to the future today with more strength and optimism, while playing the important role it has always played in the region.
A new quadrilateral meeting involving Romania, Bulgaria, Greece and Serbia is scheduled later in the day, with prime ministers of Romania, Bulgaria and Greece, as well as Serbian President Aleksandar Vucic expected to attend.
