January 24, 2022 UPDATE

CELEBRATION Romania celebrated on Monday 163 years since the Union of the Romanian Principalities, the first major step in the formation of the Romanian nation state, paving the way for the Great Union of 1918. On January 24, 1859, Alexandru Ioan Cuza was elected ruler of Wallachia, after on January 5 he had become sovereign of Moldavia. His rule laid the foundations for modern Romania. Monday was a banking holiday in Romania. While many people chose to spend the holiday in mountain resorts, the ones who stayed at home had the option of attending military and religious ceremonies and celebratory concerts organised around the country under COVID-19 restrictions. Bucharest's Patriarchal Cathedral hosted a service devoted to all those who contributed to the 1859 Union. Politicians posted messages on this occasion. President Klaus Iohannis said the Union on January 24, 1859 proves the importance of a project able to bring together the energy of the Romanian nation, and urged people to work persistently to consolidate the country's current European and democratic path. The Liberal PM Nicolae Ciucă pointed out that the Union was the result of the untiring efforts of the politicians of the time, driven by the nation's dream of unity and of administrative, economic and social progress. In turn, the speaker of the Chamber of Deputies and president of the Social Democratic Party Marcel Ciolacu said that, 163 years since the Union of the Romanian Principalities, what Romanians need more than ever is unity and stability, if they are to handle current economic, healthcare and security challenges.

COVID-19 Romanian authorities announced on Monday 12,082 new cases of SARS-CoV-2 infections in 24 hours and 41 related deaths. The incidence rate in the capital Bucharest is on the rise, reaching 10.23 cases per thousand people. The city has been in the red tier since January 12, when the incidence rate went over 3 per thousand. The COVID-19 testing capacity is set to increase this week to 150,000 tests per day, as over 3,800 family physicians have signed contracts with public health insurance agencies in this respect. In Bucharest and the nearby county of Ilfov, where the largest number of cases is reported, testing centres have already been opened in 20 hospitals. On Wednesday at the latest COVID-19 testing will also be resumed in schools, after more than 10 million test kits were received by school inspectorates. A batch of 114,000 doses of Pfizer BioNTech vaccine for children aged 5 to 11 are set to reach the country on Tuesday. The health minister Alexandru Rafila expects the current (5th) wave of the pandemic to reach its peak in Romania in about 3 weeks' time.

UKRAINE NATO countries are placing forces on standby and sending additional ships and fighter jets to NATO deployments in eastern Europe, as Russiacontinues its military build-up around Ukraine, the Alliance announced on Monday. Denmark is sending a frigate to the Baltic Sea and is set to deploy four F-16 fighter jets to Lithuania, Spain is sending ships to join NATO naval forces and is considering sending fighter jets to Bulgaria. France has expressed its readiness to send troops to Romania under NATO command. The Netherlands is sending two F-35 fighter aircraft to Bulgaria in April to support NATO's air-policing activities in the region, and is putting a ship and land-based units on standby for NATO's Response Force. The US also announced it is considering increasing its military presence in the eastern part of the Alliance.  The president of Ukraine Volodymyr Zelensky Monday thanked the EU for the 1.2 billion euros in macro-financial aid provided in order to support Kyev in a prospective conflict with Russia. "Strong Ukraine is the key for European security," he said in a Twitter post. Russia has deployed around 100,000 troops on the Ukrainian border, fuelling concerns about a prospective attack on that country.

TENNIS The Romanian tennis player Simona Halep lost to Alizé Cornet of France, 6-4, 3-6, 6-4, in the round of 16 of the Australian Open in Melbourne on Monday. For Halep (15 WTA), this was the first defeat after a string of 8 consecutive wins.Also on Monday, Sorana Cîrstea of Romania lost to seed no. 7 Iga Swiatek of Poland, in the same competition round, 5-7, 6-3, 6-3.

DOCUMENTARY The French public TV channel France 3 broadcasts for the first time a documentary on "Marie of Romania, the amazing queen of the Carpathians," as part of its highly popular history series "Secrets of history." The production of the documentary took one year and a half. Archive photos and footage have been collected, along with testimonies by historians and members of the Royal House of Romania. Scenes have been shot at the Peleş and Bran castles in the southern Carpathians, at the Cotroceni National Museum in Bucharest and at the Curtea de Argeş Monastery where Royal House members have been buried. Queen Marie, the wife of King Ferdinand I, was acknowledged in Europe as an ambassador of the Romanian nation and a supporter of the Romanian nation state. (A.M.P.)