Acquisition of first Patriot missile system to be voted in Romanian Senate today

The draft project for the acquisition of the first Patriot missile system will be debated this morning at 11.30 am in the Senate’s defense committee. The bill will reach the Senate plenary this afternoon and will be debated in the Chamber of Deputies tomorrow (on Tuesday). The draft project was supposed to be debated in the Senate’s defense committee last Tuesday, but none of the senators from the Social Democratic Party (PSD) and the Alliance of Liberals and Democrats (ALDE) attended the meeting. Following the lack of quorum, the opposition party USR accused the governing parties of jeopardizing the country’s strategic partnership with the United States. PSD leader Liviu Dragnea explained that the senators from the Senate’s defense committee failed to show up last Tuesday, because they had to attend another meeting “at the invitation of an important institution chief”. The first Patriot missile system, for which Romania has already received the acceptance letter from the US part, is worth USD 764.7 million, without VAT. It will be bought by the end of this year. Romanian Govt. approves first Patriot system purchase editor@romania-insider.com