On Tuesday 1 January Romania took over the EU presidency succeeding Austria.
The usual rotation takes place at a turbulent time for the bloc with Jean-Claude Juncker having just claimed he doesn’t have confidence in their ability to do it.
Whilst Romania has typically been one of the EU’s consistently europhile countries, their left-wing government has been changing to sound more nationalistic like nearby Hungary and Poland, becoming more populist by the day.
Brussels has been in dispute with Bucharest over a number of things including disputes over controversial reforms that critics say undermine the rule of law and are “unfair” as Liviu Dragnea the head of the Social Democrats (PSD) has said.
He has claimed Brussels is denying Bucharest the “right to hold its own opinions”.
