Romania will continue its efforts to get Canada to drop travel visas for Romanians even if the free trade agreement between the European Union and Canada, also known as CETA, is not signed, Romanian President Klaus Iohannis said on Friday evening.

However, he expressed his hope that the problems blocking the signing of the trade agreement, respectively the opposition of the Walloon Government in Belgium, would be solved this week.

“In case CETA isn’t signed, we will continue negotiations with the Canadian side. We might find a bilateral solution for the visas. However, this would be the ideal moment to solve this issue,” Iohannis said, according to Politco.eu.

Klaus Iohannis announced on Friday morning that Romania reached an agreement with Canada on the removal of travel visas for Romanians starting December 2017. However, the President of the European Commission Jean-Claude Junker made it clear that this agreement was conditioned by the signing of the EU-Canada Comprehensive Economic and Trade Agreement (CETA).

The negotiations between Canada and the Walloon Government on CETA failed on Friday and the European Commission’s attempts to convince the Walloon authorities to change their position on this deal over the weekend have failed.

A new attempt to reach an agreement should take place on Monday, in order to have the agreement ready for signing on October 27, during an EU-Canada summit.

editor@romania-insider.com