April 9, 2022 UPDATE
A roundup of local and international news.
Newsroom, 09.04.2022, 19:14
UKRAINE – Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelensky said Saturday that Ukraine was ready to continue negotiations with Moscow, which have stalled since the discovery of atrocities in Bucha and other areas near Kyiv. “We are ready to fight and to look in parallel to end this war through diplomacy,” Zelensky said in a joint press conference with the Austrian Chancellor Karl Nehammer. The Austrian official paid a solidarity visit to the capital Kyiv and to Bucha, a town which became, according to France Press, the symbol of the Russian invasion’s atrocities. The Ukrainian authorities have announced that 10 humanitarian corridors were negotiated, to evacuate civilians from the conflict regions. A state of siege was declared in the port city of Odessa, at the Black Sea, during the weekend. According to Radio Romania correspondents, regional authorities fear an attack similar to that in Kramatorsk, where at least 50 civilians were killed in a missile attack on the train station. Moscow has warned western countries, through its ambassador in Washington, Anatoly Antonov, that the further delivery of weapons to Ukraine is dangerous and provocative, as it prologues the conflict and, being directed against Russia, can lead to direct confrontation between the US and Russia.
HUMANITARIAN AID – European Commission President, Ursula von der Leyen, has promised 1 billion euro from the Commission to support Ukraine and the countries taking in refugees who flee war following the Russian invasion of their country. The announcement was made Saturday, at an online fundraising event for the Ukrainian refugees, organized by the US and Canada and hosted by Warsaw. A total of 10.1 billion euro were raised during the event dubbed “Stand up for Ukraine”, to be used for the needs of those 4 million Ukrainian refugees in the EU countries. Moreover, the financing and donations will ensure vital humanitarian assistance to those 6.5 million displaced people in Ukraine, of whom 2.5 million are children.
ELECTION — France holds presidential elections on Sunday. The 49 million eligible voters will pick their favourite from among 12 candidates, four women and eight men. The most likely scenario for the runoff is incumbent president Emmanuel Macron running against Marine Le Pen, a representative of the far right. Opinion polls have recently shown Macron only 3-4 points ahead of Le Pen, from 12 points in mid-February, which means that some 26%-27% of the people would vote for Macron and 23% for his contender. Coming out third in opinion polls, with 16%, is the far left leader Jean-Luc Melenchon.
GAS — The ruling coalition in Bucharest has sped up talks on modifying the offshore law that regulates the exploitation of the natural gas reserves that Romania has in the Black Sea. The National Liberal Party, The Social Democratic Party and the Democratic Union of Ethnic Hungarians in Romania have agreed on a final version of the law. The document will be debated by Parliament next week and is to be adopted through emergency procedure. Thus, the Romanian state should receive at least 60% of the profit obtained after the extraction of natural gas, while private companies would get 40%. Energy Minister Virgil Popescu has recently said that as of this year, Romania will benefit an additional 1 billion cubic meters of natural gas by exploiting the deposits in the Black Sea.
RATING – Fitch Ratings has put Romania’s long-term foreign currency issue default rating (IDR) at BBB- with a negative outlook, the agency said in a statement. The negative outlook reflects “continued uncertainty regarding the implementation of policies to address structural fiscal imbalances” over the medium term and the impact of the Ukraine war and energy crisis on Romanias economic, fiscal and external performance, the agency said. Fitch Ratings expects Romania’s GDP growth to slow down to 2.1% in 2022 (from 5.9% in 2021), primarily reflecting a slowdown in private consumption and exports. Investment dynamics is expected to accelerate in 2023, which combined with the assumption of a normalisation of external trade and supply chains, will lift economic growth to 4.8%, the agency also said.
REFUGEES – More than 76 thousand people entered Romania on Friday, through the border checkpoints, of whom 8,623 Ukrainian citizens, down by 5.9% as against the previous day, the Border Police General Inspectorate announced on Saturday. Since the Russian invasion of Ukraine, almost 660 thousand refugees have entered Romania. Most of them only transited the country, heading for Western Europe. (EE)
