(Bloomberg) -- Romanian President Klaus Iohannis slammed the government for not consulting him before announcing a plan to move the country's embassy in Israel to Jerusalem.
Iohannis, who according to the Romanian Constitution leads foreign policy and represents the country abroad, urged the cabinet to refrain from any decision before a thorough assessment, according to an emailed statement on Friday. Ruling party leader Liviu Dragnea said in an interview on Antena 3 late Thursday that the government had approved a memorandum to start the procedure to re-locate the embassy to Jerusalem, following the example of the U.S.
“The government's initiative can eventually represent, at the most, the start of an evaluating process, which can be completed only when peace talks in the Middle East are finalized,” Iohannis said in the statement. “Romania continues to support a fair resolution of the conflict, through the implementation of a ‘two-state' solution.”
Romania, a NATO member that has a strategic partnership with the U.S., is among the few countries to announce a potential decision to move its embassy in Israel after President Donald Trump decided this year to act on his recognition of Jerusalem as Israel's capital by relocating the U.S. embassy there from Tel Aviv. Dragnea has sent several officials to Israel in recent years and met with Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu last July.
To contact the reporter on this story: Andra Timu in Bucharest at atimu@bloomberg.net.
To contact the editors responsible for this story: Andrea Dudik at adudik@bloomberg.net, Michael Winfrey, Paul Abelsky
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