July 8, 2021 UPDATE

A roundup of domestic and international news

Newsroom, 08.07.2021, 20:00

COVID-19 ROMANIA – The Romanian
government has approved, at the proposal of the National Committee for
Emergency Situations, the extension of the state of alert across Romania for
another 30 days, starting July 12. The prevention and control measures in force
at the moment will continue to be applied, with some changes. The most
important is the extension from 90 to 180 days of the period of exemption from
these measures for those persons who have already had the infection. On the
other hand, the head of the vaccination campaign, Valeriu Gheorghiţă, has drawn
attention to the fact that, as of mid-August, the number of COVID-19 cases in
Romania will increase due to the new ‘Delta’ virus strain and he has again
called for the population to get vaccinated. Since the beginning of the
vaccination campaign in Romania, in December last year, almost 4.8 million
people have been vaccinated, of whom about 4.6 million with both doses. 30 new
cases of contamination and 3 deaths have been reported in the past 24 hours,
and 57 patients are in ICUs.

COVID-19 WORLD – Dozens of
new cases of infection with the ‘Delta’ strain of the SARS-CoV-2 virus and one
case of ‘Beta’ infection have been identified in Bulgaria, Romania’s neighbor.
In Japan, the Government announced a state of emergency amidst the growing
number of COVID-19 infections. As a result, the Tokyo Olympics, a competition
that is set to begin in two weeks’ time, will unfold without crowd attendance.
The Delta strain of the novel coronavirus, first identified in India, continues
to spread rapidly around the world. The Australian city of Sydney on Wednesday
recorded the highest number of new cases this year, South Korea reported the
highest rate since the onset of the pandemic, and a study published in London shows
that the number of infections in England has increased 4 times since June until
now. Spain saw an increase in the number of new cases, especially among young
people. 1% of young people between 20 and 24 who have been infected should be
hospitalized – the Spanish authorities have warned. Globally, more than 185
million cases of infection have been reported so far and at least 4 million people
have died, according to worldometers.info.
Most cases and deaths were recorded in the United States, India and Brazil.

DISMISSAL –
Romania’s president Klaus Iohannis on Thursday signed the decree dismissing
Finance Minister, Alexandru Nazare. Under the same decree, Prime Minister Florin
Cîţu will take over as interim Finance Minister. Prime Minister Cîţu explained
that, upon evaluating the activity of the finance ministry, he discovered
delays of some important projects which are aimed at eliminating tax evasion
and attracting European funds. Nazare is the second Minister sacked by the
ruling PNL-USR-PLUS-UDMR coalition after former Health Minister, Vlad
Voiculescu.

3SI – The
economies of countries in Central and Eastern Europe will grow faster than
those of countries in Western Europe over the next years, IMF Director
Kristalina Georgieva said on Thursday on the sidelines of the Three Seas
Initiative (3SI) summit hosted by Sofia, Bulgaria. The IMF official said the
combined GDP of the 12 3SI member states could this year return to the level
reported before the pandemic. The organization is a flexible, informal
political platform at presidential level, bringing together the 12 EU member
states located between the Baltic Sea, the Adriatic Sea and the Black Sea.
Romania is represented by President Klaus Iohannis, who will emphasize the
importance of implementing priority strategic interconnection projects, with a
focus on projects of high interest for Romania, namely Rail2Sea ​​and Via
Carpatia. From Bucharest’s standpoint, these projects are essential for the
Initiative to really bring about long-term economic development, and to make
the economy of participating states more strategically resilient. We recall
that Bucharest hosted the Three Seas Initiative summit in September 2018.

UKRAINE – On the sidelines of Ukraine Reform
Conference, organized in hybrid format in Vilnius, Foreign Minister, Bogdan
Aurescu, said Romania continues to support the sovereignty and territorial
integrity of this country, reiterating Bucharest’s firm commitment to oppose
the illegal annexation of Crimea by the Russian Federation. Bogdan Aurescu said
Romania supports Ukraine’s European track and its process of comprehensive and
inclusive reforms, based on the country’s commitments under the Association
Agreement signed with the European Union. Ukraine Reform Conference is an
international annual event organized since 2017, bringing together officials
from Ukraine and partner states, representatives of the EU, NATO and G7, of the
business community and civil society. (LS & VP)