Romania

Romania (old spelling: Rumania, Roumania; , ) is a country in southeastern Europe. It is north of the Balkan Peninsula, on the Lower Danube River. Western Romania is circled by the Carpathian Mountains. Romania also has a border on the Black Sea. Most of the Danube Delta is found inside Romania. Romania shares borders with Hungary and Serbia to the west, Ukraine to the far northeast, the Republic of Moldova to the near northeast, and Bulgaria to the south.
Romania is a semi-presidential unitary state. It was created when Moldavia and Wallachia joined in 1859. It was given its independence in the Treaty of Berlin of 1878. At the end of World War II, some of its land (close by what is now known as Moldova) was occupied by the USSR. After the Iron Curtain fell in 1989 Romania was liberated from the communist regime. During the 2000s, Romania made changes to the country, such as reform the democratic system, human rights acts, freedom of speech acts, economy and law. That let Romania join the European Union on January 1, 2007.
Romania has the 9th biggest area of land and the 7th biggest population (with 19 million people) of the European Union member states. The capital and biggest city in Romania is Bucharest ( ), with a population of 1.6 million. One of the cities in Transylvania, Sibiu, was named a European Capital of Culture. Romania joined NATO on March 29, 2004.
Origin
The word Romania (Rumania or Romania) comes from the Romanian word Roman, which comes from the Latin word Romanus which means "Roman". English texts still used the word Rumania during World War II. This came from the French word Roumanie.
History
Prehistory and the Romans
Some of the oldest human remains found in Europe were discovered in Romania. They were about 42,000 years old. This may have been when the first Homo sapiens came to Europe.
The world's first and oldest writing comes from people who lived in today's Romania. Approximately 5300 years BC. According to archaeology it is not a matter of symbols, but the world's first writings. It belonged to the Vinca culture which inhabited all of today's Serbia with over 150 Vinca sites and minor parts of Western Romania, northwestern Bulgaria, eastern Bosnia and Herzegovina and Southeastern Hungary.
Herodotus in the fourth book of The Histories, written in about 440 . Herodotus wrote that the Getae were defeated by the Persian Emperor Darius the Great when he battled the Scythians. The Getae were called the Dacians by the Romans. They were Thracians who were living in Dacia, which is where Romania, Moldova and the northern part of Bulgaria are now. The Dacians attacked the Roman province, the border of which was formed by the Danube, in 87 . This was during Emperor Domitian's rule. The Dacians were defeated by the Roman Empire under Emperor Trajan in two battles that lasted from 101 until 106 . The Roman Empire made Dacia into the province of Roman Dacia.
A lot of ore, such as gold and silver, were found in Roman Dacia. A lot of gold and silver were found in the Western Carpathians. Trajan went back to Rome with 165 tons (330,000 pounds) of gold and 330 tons (660,000 pounds) of silver after his conquest.
There were many Romans living in the province of Roman Dacia. They spoke Vulgar Latin. They began to write the local languages using the Latin alphabet. Writing languages with the Latin alphabet is called romanization. This became the first version of Romanian.
In the 3rd century, the province was attacked by groups of nomadic people like the Goths. They made the Roman Empire leave Dacia about 271 . This became the Roman Empire's first abandoned province.
The origin of modern Romanians is widely talked about by historians to this day. It is thought that the Romanians were formed from large ethnic groups that came from both the south and north parts of the Danube.
Dark Ages and Middle Ages
From 271 to 275, the Goths took over the abandoned Roman province. They lived in Dacia until the 4th century, when another group of wandering peoples, the Huns, came to Dacia. The Gepids, Avars, with the Slavic people, were in control of Transylvania through the 8th century. In the 8th century, however, the country was taken over by the Hungarian Empire. It was made part of the First Bulgarian Empire, which ended Romania's Dark Ages.
The Bulgarians held Transylvania until the 11th century. The Pechenegs, the Cumans, and the Uzes were a few of the people later noted in the history of Romania.
In 1310, now called the High Middle Ages, Basarab I started the Romanian principality of Wallachia. Moldavia was begun by Dragos around 1352. During the Middle Ages, Romanians were living in three different areas: Wallachia (Romanian: Tara Romaneasca--"Romanian Land"), Moldavia (Romanian: Moldova), and Transylvania.
Transylvania belonged to the Kingdom of Hungary from around the 10th century until the 16th century, when it turned into the Principality of Transylvania. This lasted until 1711. Wallachia had been on the border of the Ottoman Empire since the 14th century. As the Ottoman Empire's influence grew, it gradually fell under the suzerainty (control) of the Ottoman Empire in the 15th century.
The best known ruler of this period was Vlad III the Impaler, also known as Vlad Dracula, or , , Prince of Wallachia, during the years of 1448, 1456-62, and 1476. While he was the leader of his people, he had an agreement with the Ottoman Empire to stay independent. Many people in Romania during this time thought of him as a ruler with a great sense of justice and defense for his country.
Moldavia was at its greatest when Stephen the Great was ruling between 1457 and 1504. He was a great military leader, winning 47 battles and losing only 2. After every battle he won, Stephen would build a church. Because he won 47 of the battles that he fought, he ended up building 48 churches. After Stephen the Great's death, Moldavia came under the suzerainty of the Ottoman Empire during the 16th century.
Independence and monarchy
When Transylvania was the organic part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire, and the Ottoman Empire controlled Wallachia and Moldavia, almost all Romanians had limited rights as a citizen. They stayed this way even when they made up most of the people in those areas.
The violent Revolution of 1848 failed, due to Russian intervention. Under an 1856 treaty between Russia and the Ottomans, popular assemblies in 1859 in Moldavia and Wallachia picked the same person - Alexandru Ioan Cuza - to be the prince in those areas. He managed to unite the people and nationalism was seen as a useful method.
The Prince cautiously did not proclaiming independence immediately because he knew it would bring a new war. Instead, he let Moldavia and Wallachia merge in the United Principalities of the Ottoman Empire and increasing self-government. The new union eventually developed into today's Romania. Its ruler gradually freed himself from Ottoman control and Bucharest became the capital. The abolition of serfdom led to a coup d'etat against the Prince staged by peasants who overthrew the regime.
Prince Karl of Hohenzollern-Sigmaringen became the new leader, and was later called Prince Carol I of Romania. In the Russo-Turkish War, Romania battled on the Russian side. When the Treaty of Berlin of 1878 was signed, the Great Powers made Romania an independent state. In return, they had to give Russia three of their southern districts of Bessarabia. In 1881, the principality became a kingdom, with Prince Carol ruling as King Carol I.
The World Wars and the Great Leaders
World War I
When World War I started in August 1914, Romania said it was a neutral country. In 1916, the Allies promised to give Romania parts of the Austro-Hungarian Empire where many Romanians lived, if Romania started a war against Austria-Hungary.
The military campaign ended in disaster after Romania's forces were defeated in 1917 and Moldova was one of the few parts of Romania that was not captured. When the Allies eventually won the war, the Austria-Hungarian Empire was dissolved and an independent Hungarian republic was proclaimed. Bessarabia, Bukovina, and Transylvania became part of the Kingdom of Romania in 1918 as had been promised. After the Treaty of Trianon in 1920, Hungary formally gave up any claims over Transylvania. Romania and Bukovina were joined in 1919 as a result of the Treaty of Saint Germain. Bessarabia joined with Romania in 1920 when the Treaty of Paris was signed.
Greater Romania
After World War I was much bigger and more nationalist. The small Kingdom received ("major Transylvania"). The principalities Wallachia, Moldavia and Bessarabia (Moldova) together formed the "Greater Romania" 1918-1940. "Greater Romania" did not survive World War II.
Romanians called their country Romania Mare, meaning Great Romania or Greater Romania, in the time between World War I and World War II. They called it so because it controlled of land.
The Great Depression meant social unrest, high unemployment, strikes and riots, especially a miners' strike in 1929 in Valea Jiului and a strike in Grivitas maintenance workshops. By the mid-1930s, with a recovering Romanian economy, industry grew, although about 80% of Romanians still were engaged in agriculture.
Iron Guard
In end of 1930s, Romania's liberal democracy was slowly being replaced by the fascist dictatorship. The Archangel Michael Legion, known as the Iron Guard organization, was led by Corneliu Codreanu Zelea. In 1937 elections the party supported Adolf Hitler and Nazism and got 15.5% of the votes and became the third biggest party. In 1938 king Carol II of Romania seized power over Romania. He dissolved all political parties and executed Corneliu Codreanu Zelea along with 12 other leaders.
World War II
Carol II of Romania declared the country as neutral when World War II broke out in 1939, but included since the Soviet Union occupied Bessarabia and northern Bukovina an alliance with Hitler's Germany. This occurred after field marshal Ion Antonescu forced the authoritarian Carol II of Romania to abdicate. Antonescu appointed himself "conducator", Romania's dictator, and signed at the November 23 of 1940 three-powers pact with Nazi Germany. Hitler's Germany was dependent on a continuous importation of fuel and crude oil from the Romanian oil fields of Ploesti. In 1940, yjr Kingdom of Hungary took over the legitimate domination in Northern Transylvania to the end of the World War II.
The country's troops fought together with the German Wehrmacht against the Soviet Union.
In summer of 1941, Romania join Hitler's war against the Soviet Union in combination also Finland, Slovakia and Hungary join Hitlers war. Romania built concentration camps and began conducting a massive persecution of Jews, of which became very extreme in the city of Iasi.
Holocaust in Romania
Romania participated in the Holocaust. The author of the book "The Destruction of the European Jews" Raul Hilberg writes follow: "There was / ... / moment when the Germans actually had to intervene and slow the speed with which the Romanian measures were taken." The hunt for Jews in eastern Romania (including Bessarabia, Bukovina, Transnistria and the city of Iasi) had more the character of pogroms than the German, well-organized camps and transport.
There were pogroms in the city of Iasi. The homes for the Jewish minority in Iasi were marked with crosses. On June 27, 1941, Ion Antonescu make a phone call with the city's mayor and Antonescu said into the phone: "clean the city Iasi from the Jews." And the Holocaust in Romania has began. Police officers and many civilians went to every Jewish home marked with a cross in the town and murdered thousands of Jews on the same day.
In June 1941, the Romanian dictator Ion Antonescu gave an "illegal secret order" to the special police force. He ordered the police in cooperation with the Romanian Army and the German SS troops to kill all Jews in east Romania within the next coming years. The Jews living on the countryside was being killed right on the spot. The Jews in the cities were first collected in the ghettos and later deported away.
On October 22, 1941 the Soviet union with bombs blow up the Romanian military headquarters in Odessa, and killed 66 Romanian soldiers. As revenge Ion Antonescu decided that for every dead Romanian officer, 200 Soviet communists must be killed and for each dead soldier, 100 communists must be killed. All other Communists were imprisoned and Jewish families were taken hostage in the hope that the partisan movement would cease its operations.
The day after in Bucharest, on October 23, 1941, around 5 000 people and the majority were Jews was arrested who later executed by hanging. In the Soviet village Dalnik, almost 20,000 Jews were incarcerated in to several locked buildings and burned alive.
After the massacre, many of the Jews who remained in Odessa were sent to various concentration camps. Nearby Odessa on October 25, 1941, approximately 40,000 Jews, was gathering together on a special closed military secured area, and the Jews had to stay outdoors for more than ten days without food or supply. Many died of cold and starvation. The survivors were murdered one month later.
Totally approximately 469,000 Jews had been murdered by the military and police in Romania between 1941 and 1944, including the 325,000 murdered Jews in Bessarabia and Bukovina.
End of war
At the end of 1943, the Red Army liberated most of Soviet territory and started advancing westward from its borders to defeat Nazi Germany and its allies. It was in this context that the Soviet forces crossed Romania. If the Soviet Union could hit Romania, Nazi Germany's last hope is gone, said the military leadership of the Red Army. Russians deposited the entire 1.5 million soldiers in the attack against Romania and Romania last reserves consisting only of 138 000 soldiers. During the summer of 1944 it began the attack on Bessarabia (Moldova) and the Romanian army fled the area. On 2 August, the whole Bessarabia (Moldova) is captured by the Red Army. The Russians then went a long way in Romania and on 23 August they reached into the Romanian capital Bucharest. The public opinion turned in the country against Antonescu and of summer 1944 he was deposed and imprisoned. The new government signed a ceasefire and extradited itself to the Soviet Union. The Red Army killed the members from the old fascist regime (including Ion Antonescu) on June 1, 1946.
At the end of the war, Romania was allowed to keep the whole of Transylvania in west and Dobruja from south, but lost Bessarabia/Transnistria and Odessa Oblast in the east (with rich oil reserves) which became parts of the Soviet Union. Bukovina was split in half because in the north part the majority ethnic group was Ukrainian and in the south part Romanian.
The Soviet Union replaced the royal monarchy with a communist regime in 1947. The Soviet Union took the country's resources, which led to increased poverty in Romania.
Romania and communism
Michael I abdicated the throne and had to leave Romania in 1947 because of the Communists. Romania changed from a monarchy into a republic. The USSR occupied Romania until the late 1950s, when Soviet troops left Romania. During this time, resources in Romania were taken by the Soviet Union due to agreements made by Communist leaders.
After the Soviet troops left Romania, Nicolae Ceausescu wanted Romania to become more independent from Moscow. Romania started following slightly different foreign policies than Moscow. After the Six-Day War in 1967, Romania began talks with Israel and started relations with the Federal Republic of Germany. Romania started to have their own relations with Arab countries. Romania officials were allowed to participate in peace talks between Israel and Egypt and between Israel and the Palestine Liberation Organization.
The national debt Romania owed to other countries went from $3 billion to almost $10 billion between 1977 and 1981. The amount of money that Romania owed other countries caused them to rely on banks and other lenders from around the world. President Nicolae Ceausescu's autarchic ways meant he did not want to rely on other countries and Romania paid back money borrowed from other countries. This affected the Romanian economy. To try to stay in power, Ceausescu had anyone who disagreed with him arrested and put in prison. Many people were killed or hurt. Almost 60,000 people were put in psychiatric hospitals. Ceausescu eventually lost power and was killed in the Romanian Revolution of 1989.
1989 to 2007
In 1989, the National Salvation Front came into power. It was led by Ion Iliescu. When they came into power, several other parties from before World War II were remade. These included the Christian-Democratic National Peasants' Party, the National Liberal Party and the Romanian Social Democrat Party. In April 1990, as a result of several rallies, protests started. The people who protested did not recognize the results of the election. This was because they thought that members of the National Salvation Front were communists. More and more people protested, and it became a demonstration - a very big protest. This was called the Golaniad, and it became very violent.
When the National Salvation Front lost power, several other parties were made. These were the Social Democratic Party, the Democratic Party, and a couple of other parties from before the war. The Social Democratic Party ruled Romania from 1990 until 1996. Ion Iliescu was the head of state, or person in charge. After 1996, several other parties came into power and lost it. In 2004, Traian Basescu became the president.
After the Cold War, Romania became closer friends with Western Europe. In 2004, Romania joined NATO and hosted the 2008 summit. The country applied in June 1993 for membership in the European Union and became an Associated State of the EU in 1995, an Acceding Country in 2004, and a member on January 1, 2007.
Geography
Romania is a part of southeastern Europe. It borders the Black Sea and the Danube River. The Carpathian Mountains lie in the center.
Romania is the biggest country in southeast Europe by population. It has an area of . It is the twelfth-largest country in Europe. Most of Romania's border with Serbia and Bulgaria is made by the Danube. The Danube joins the Prut River. The Prut River makes the Moldovan-Romanian border. The Danube then flows into the area of the Black Sea inside Romania. This makes the Danube Delta. The delta is a biosphere reserve and a biodiversity World Heritage Site. Some of the other major rivers in Romania are the Siret, the Olt, and the Mures. The Siret River runs from the north to the south of Moldavia. The Olt River runs from the Carpathian Mountains to Oltenia. The Mures runs through Transylvania from the east to the west.
Landscape
The land in Romania is made up of equal parts of mountains, hills, and low-lying areas. The Carpathian Mountains make up a big part of the center of Romania. Fourteen of its mountain ranges are taller than . The tallest mountain in Romania is Moldoveanu Peak, with a peak altitude of .
Rivers
The Danube is the longest river in Romania. Its length inside Romania is about . That is almost half of the length of the entire Danube. Almost all of the rivers in Romania are either direct or indirect tributaries of the Danube.
Weather
Romania has a climate that changes between temperate and continental climates. The reason for the climate changes is because Romania is near the coast. Romania has four different seasons. The average temperature during the year is in southern Romania and in the northern part.
Lots of rain and snow falls on the highest western mountains. Most of this falls as snow. In the southern parts of the country, the amount of rain and snow that falls is around .
The lowest temperature ever taken in Romania was , at Brasov in 1944. The highest temperature ever recorded in Romania was , near Calafat in the 1950s.
Society
These are the development regions of Romania:
Northeast
West
Northwest
Center
Southeast
South
Bucharest-Ilfov
Southwest
Language and culture
The official language of Romania is Romanian. The Romanian language is an Eastern Romance language.
Romania has its own culture because of where it is found. It is the point where 3 different areas meet: Central Europe, Eastern Europe, and the Balkans. Romanian culture is a mix of all these areas. The culture of Romania was influenced by the Greeks, Romans, and Slavs.
Religion
Romania is a secular state. This means Romania has no national religion. The biggest religious group in Romania is the Romanian Orthodox Church. It is an autocephalous church inside of the Eastern Orthodox communion. In 2002, this religion made up 86.7% of the population. Other religions in Romania include Roman Catholicism (4.7%), Protestantism (3.7%), Pentecostalism (1.5%), Islam (1%) and the Romanian Greek-Catholicism (0.9%).
Cities
Bucharest is the capital of Romania. It also is the biggest city in Romania, with a population of over 2 millions peoples.
There are 5 other cities in Romania that have a population of more than 300,000 people. These are Iasi, Cluj-Napoca, Timisoara, Constanta, and Craiova. Romania also has 5 cities that have more than 200,000 people living in them: Galati, Brasov, Ploiesti, Braila, and Oradea.
Thirteen other cities in Romania have a population of more than 100,000 people.
Economy
Romania joined the European Union on January 1, 2007. Romania's economy is healthy. Currently, Romania makes around $350 billion in Gross domestic product and a GDP per capita of $16,540.
Long into the 1900s, Romania was still a largely agricultural country. During Communism 1947-1989, the country had planned economy. The transition from planned economy to a market economy after the communist regime led to economic collapse in the 1990s, the reasons was that more money was printed, expensive prices and substantial privatization of the companies, which initially leads to skyrocketing unemployment. The reforms in the 1990s allowed foreign investors for the first time to buy land in Romania. When it was going well for industry in the Latin countries such as France, Italy and Spain, they began to trade with Romania. Foreign companies have expanded in Romania since then, and spurs the market.
Romania has the highest percentage of homeowners in Europe. The fall of communism prompted many Romanians to purchase the flats they lived in cheaply while the country underwent a wave of privatisation and devaluation of the currency.
Education
In Romania school is compulsory for 10 years. Children have the opportunity to be part of a voluntary pre-school for age 3-6 years. After school, students can voluntarily take the entrance exam to high school, which has a range of practical and theoretical lines. There are over 40 higher educational institutions, including five universities and five technical colleges. Tuition is free and is a hot political commitment even at the university. The country's minorities can have instruction in their native language. Since 1989, education has been reformed. But it has been slow and the standard of education varies greatly in different parts of the country, Education has improved the standard of urban compared to rural areas where quality can be very low. Romania participates fully in the EU's education program.
Social welfare
The unemployment rate in Romania is 5% and has been low for many years.
The living standards were very low at the end of the Communist era, but the situation improved a little bit during the 1990s. The large privatization resulted in high unemployment and rising prices. In 2010 nearly 10% of the population were in absolute poverty and of these, 90% live in rural areas. The State social insurance system have relatively broad coverage but resources are extremely small.
Reforms have been initiated and in 1999 the health insurance became privatized and paid by the employers and the employees. Several thousand local trade unions were founded after the revolution, which were later combined into federations. These unions and federations have helped organise students, pensioners and the unemployed; because these groups of people all have similar needs, concerns and goals.
By the first quarter of 2011 the average monthly household income is 2,318 Romanian leu (equivalent to approximately PS862 USD). Income is 36% higher in the urban area than in the countryside.
The pension system is reformed.
The most worrying thing is the fact that there are more pensioners than the number of working people. because many who dismissed during the privatizations had per-retirement. Romanian Pensioners average pension at the month is at about 190 euros (equivalent to approximately PS250-300 USD). The current low average retirement age (55 years for men and 57 years for women) will be gradually increased until 2014, when it gets to 60 years for women and 65 years for men.
Many of the country's Gypsies have no identity cards and are therefore are excluded from the social benefit systems, schools and health care. The State-run health care is free, but the care system is neglected and has deteriorated in recent years due to lack of resources and underpaid staff. In many cases, the patients pay "under the table" to get treatment. There is evidence to suggest that a patient's wealth plays an important role in how they receive medical treatment.
Science and technology
Historically, Romanian researches and inventors have made notable contributions to several fields, such as: aeronautics, medicine, mathematics, computer science/engineering, physics, biophysics, chemistry, biochemistry and biology. In the history of flight, Traian Vuia and Aurel Vlaicu built and flew some of the earliest successful aircraft, while Henri Coanda discovered the Coanda effect of fluidics. Preceding him, Elie Carafoli was a pioneering contributor to the field of aerodynamics in the world.
Victor Babes discovered more than 50 germs and a cure for a disease named after him, babesiosis; biologist Nicolae Paulescu discovered insulin. Another biologist, Emil Palade, received the Nobel Prize for his contributions to cell biology. George Constantinescu created the theory of sonics, while Lazar Edeleanu was the first chemist to synthesize amphetamine and also invented the modern method of refining crude oil. Costin Nenitescu found new methods for the synthesis of pirilium salts, of carbenes, tryptamine, serotonin, two new syntheses for the indole nucleus, and a new method of polymerisation of ethylene.
Several mathematicians distinguished themselves as well, among them: Gheorghe Titeica, Spiru Haret, Grigore Moisil, Miron Nicolescu, Nicolae Popescu and Stefan Odobleja; the latter is also regarded as the ideological father behind cybernetics.
Notable physicists and inventors also include: Horia Hulubei in atomic physics, Serban Titeica in theoretical physics, Mihai Gavrila specialized in quantum theory and discoverer of the atomic dichotomy phenomenon, Alexandru Proca (known for the first meson theory of nuclear forces and Proca's equations of the vectorial mesonic field), Stefan Procopiu known for the first theory of the magnetic moment of the electron in 1911 (now known as the Bohr-Procopiu magneton), Theodor V. Ionescu, the inventor of a multiple-cavity magnetron (1935), a hydrogen maser in 1947, 3D imaging for cinema/television in 1924 and hot deuterium plasma studies for controlled nuclear fusion, Ionel Solomon known for the nuclear magnetic resonance theory in solids, Solomon equations and photovoltaic devices, Petrache Poenaru, Nicolae Teclu and Victor Toma, with the latter known for the invention and construction of the first Romanian computer, the CIFA-1 in 1955.
The nuclear physics facility of the European Union's proposed Extreme Light Infrastructure (ELI) laser will be built in Romania. Romania currently has 1,400 MW of nuclear power capacity by means of one active nuclear power plant (Cernavoda) with 2 reactors, which constitutes around 18% of the national power generation capacity of the country. This makes Romania the 23rd largest user of nuclear power in the world.
Government
Politics
The Constitution of Romania is found to be based from the Constitution of France's Fifth Republic. It was passed into law on December 8, 1991. after a referendum was held. 73 amendments were added to the constitution in October 2003 to bring the constitution of Romania up to code with the constitution of the European Union.
The legislative branch of the Romanian government is known as the Parliament. It contains two chambers - the Senate, containing 140 members, and the Chamber of Deputies, which has 346 members. The members of both chambers are elected every four years through party-list proportional representation.
The judicial branch of the Romanian government is separate from the other branches. It is made up of a system of courts. The court with the most authority is the High Court of Cassation and Justice, which is the supreme court of Romania. Other courts, including appeal, county, and local courts also make up the judicial branch of the Romanian Government. The way the system of courts works in Romania is modelled off of the French model of law. It is based on civil law.
Divisions
Romania is divided into 41 counties, including the municipality of Bucharest, which is also its own county.
Romania is divided further into 319 cities and 2,686 communes. Each of the communes has its own council that is led by a mayor.
Army
The Romanian Army is made up of Land, Air, and Naval Forces, which are all led by a Commander-in-chief. The commander-in-chief is given orders by the Ministry of Defense. During war, the President leads the Army. 90,000 people were in the Romanian Army in 2003: 15,000 civilians and 75,000 military people. Of the 75,000 military people in the Romanian Army, 45,800 are in the land forces, 13,250 are in the air forces, 6,800 are in the naval forces, and 8,800 in other areas of the military.