February 16, 2021 UPDATE

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Newsroom, 16.02.2021, 20:14

ECONOMY Romania’s Prime Minister Florin Cîţu says a
V-shaped recovery of the Romanian economy is certain, after data made public
by the National Statistics Institute for the last quarter of 2020 point to a
5.3% growth rate. He mentioned that in 2020, Romania’s economy, just like the
global economy, was hit by the biggest crisis of the last century. Florin Cîţu
also added that last year Romania performed 5% better than originally
estimated, and 2.5% in average better than all forecasts made by international
institutions, the EC, financial rating agencies and other financial
institutions. In another development, a Bloomberg survey published on Tuesday
shows that the evolution of the Romanian economy has outperformed other EU economies
in the fourth quarter of 2020 after a government’s decision not to impose the
severe restrictions, which closed down most of the continent.

PROTESTS Representatives of the hospitality
industry organized in Bucharest on Tuesday new protests against the pandemic
containment measures introduced by the authorities. Employers in the sector
demand the payment of the promised compensations for last year, when their
operations declined by 70%. In Monday’s meeting with hospitality
representatives, the economy minister Claudiu Năsui promised that the
government earmarked over 510 million euros for financial support in the draft
budget. On Monday, members of Sanitas Union Federation picketed the Finance
Ministry headquarters to warn that a smaller budget for public healthcare in a
year with a coronavirus pandemic is not only an injustice to the workers in the
system, but also deeply immoral to Romania’s citizens.

STATEMENT Romanian Foreign Minister Bogdan Aurescu
on Tuesday said the way in which the visit of the head of the EU diplomacy,
Josep Borrell and the news conference that followed were staged as well as the
expulsion of European diplomats, show that Russia is rather on a position of
confrontation than openness. The Romanian official made this statement at the
end of his talks with the Minister of Foreign and European Affairs of Slovakia,
Ivan Korcok, on a formal visit to Bucharest on Tuesday. Aurescu has also added
that all these aspects are going to be discussed during the Foreign Affairs
Council session on Monday to draw the right conclusion and take the necessary
measures. According to Ivan Korcok thorough talks are needed on the EU-Russia
relations, as they have shown some negative developments in recent years.

MOTION The Chamber of Deputies is to vote on
Wednesday on the first simple motion of this legislative term, tabled by the Social
Democrats in opposition against the health minister Vlad Voiculescu. The
Deputies discussed the motion on Monday. The Social Democrats claim that Minister
Voiculescu was not sufficiently involved in the immunisation and testing
programmes, and that he issued messages conflicting with the coordinators of
the national vaccination campaign, discouraging the healthcare workers involved
in the process. Vlad Voiculescu replied that during his 2 months in office, he
earmarked close to 10 million Euros for investments in hospitals.