Founder and Editor-in-Chief
Founder and editor-in-chief of Triunghi.md. Ion (Nalyk) Calmîș has worked at the intersection of journalism and technology in the Republic of Moldova for over two decades — a road that began in Ungheni, as a reporter at the newspaper Unghiul. He is CTO of Studio Technologies, the company behind the platforms of some of the country's most-read newsrooms (unimedia.info, jurnal.md, jurnaltv.md, tvrmoldova.md), and Head of AI Ecosystem at Esempla Systems (Moldova's GovStack infrastructure); he co-founded the newsroom Replica Media. At Triunghi.md he puts that experience — and artificial intelligence, at scale — in the service of local journalism built on source triangulation (People, Documents, Data) and on impartiality.
Mayor Vitalie Vrabie wants the 10.3-million-lei rebuild of Burebista Street in Ungheni finished this summer. The city hall says the works are being slowed by fences put up on public land.
Alongside the municipality of Ungheni, a second bloc is taking shape in the district: the commune of Sculeni is merging with Cioropcani, Buciumeni and with Taxobeni — a commune from the neighbouring district of Fălești. The Secretary General of the Government, Alexei Buzu, promoted the merger in a video; the Sculeni and Buciumeni commune councils voted for the merger on 30 July, Taxobeni on 31 July, and Cioropcani on 10 August.
An assembly of residents in the commune of Măcărești voted for a voluntary merger with the municipality of Ungheni, and the local council is set to decide on Tuesday, 16 June. The commune was not on the list of ten localities announced by the city on 10 June — it would be the eleventh.
The National Reunification Platform held a forum in Ungheni in support of Moldova's union with Romania — a cause that remains off the official agenda, which is focused on EU integration.
The city's second-tier team drew its friendly with Dacia Buiucani, a club from Liga 7777 — Moldova's top division of football.
Moldova and Romania have opened negotiations on a new agreement on strategic transport infrastructure, whose flagship project is the road bridge between Ungheni and Zagarancea, over the Prut. It will be the first road crossing at Ungheni and the first motorway-grade bridge over the river in six decades, funded with European money. But the bridge will be ready before the roads that are supposed to feed it — a gap that shows both the ambition and the limits of integration.
On 10 June the Border Police celebrated its professional day, marked in Ungheni too, at the Palace of Culture, where the district administration presented the force with a Diploma of Honour. Beyond the ceremony, the city has a particular reason to celebrate: it hosts the West Regional Directorate, the structure overseeing eight sectors of the Moldovan-Romanian border — including Sculeni, one of the busiest road gateways to the European Union. Ungheni is also home to the country's only institution that trains border police officers.
The town of Ungheni and nine communes and villages — including Brătuleni, from Nisporeni district — would form a single town hall of roughly 44,000 residents. Residents can submit proposals until 29 June, during the public consultation that precedes the council vote.
Mayor Vitalie Vrabie and district head Dionisie Ternovschi are attending the annual Eurocities conference (8–10 June) in Utrecht — the network's second meeting in three months. Membership costs the municipal budget €7,560 a year, a sum approved publicly by the city council. Fifteen months after joining, the concrete record so far is mostly about visibility — a profile in the network and the social-medical day centre showcased as a model — with no projects or funding secured.
