January 13, 2022 UPDATE

A roundup of local and international news.

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Newsroom, 13.01.2022, 19:44

COVID-19.
Nearly 10,000 new Covid infections and 36 related deaths were reported on
Thursday in Romania. The incidence rate is on the rise around the country,
including in the capital Bucharest, where it passed 3 cases per 1,000
inhabitants, the city now being in the red tier. This means that restaurants,
cinemas, gyms and other venues can open at 30% capacity. Also, schools where
the vaccine uptake among staff is under 60% will switch to online teaching. On
Thursday, the committee coordinating vaccination said the Cominarty-Pfizer
BioNTech vaccine will become available to children aged 5 to 11 from 26th
January.

List. The entire Romania is in red on the updated map published
on Thursday by the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control,
which means the alert level concerning the epidemiological situation was raised
to 3 out of 4. Last week, only Bucharest and the surrounding Ilfov county were
in red, the rest being green or yellow. With the exception of eastern Europe,
almost all countries in the EU are in dark red, indicating maximum alert level
4.

Protest.
Public education staff on Thursday picketed the headquarters of the government
and of the two main ruling parties, the Social Democratic Party and the National
Liberal Party. Trade unions in the sector are unhappy with the government’s
failure to increase wages as stipulated by a 2017 salary law. The protest was
organised by the three major trade union federations in the sector, which argue
that the teachers’ net pay rise of only 13 euros per month from 1st
January triggered overwhelming discontent among employees. The three
federations are currently holding a poll to decide whether to go on strike over
the matter.

Funding. Romania received over 1.9 billion euros
worth of funding as pre-financing as part of its national recovery and
resilience plan. A first payment of 1.85 billion euros was made on 2nd
December. In total, Romania is earmarked to receive more than 29 billion euros
from Brussels under its recovery and resilience plan. The advantageous loans as
part of this programme will be used to fund large-scale infrastructure
projects: hundreds of kilometres of motorway, connecting tens of thousands of
homes to water and sewerage networks, facilities for the digitalisation of
thousands of small and medium sized businesses and the reforestation of tens of
thousands of hectares, said the Romanian ministry for investments and European
projects in a statement.

OSCE. After a
Russia-OSCE meeting on Thursday, the US said it would not accept Moscow’s
blackmail and its demand to maintain its spheres of influence, while Russia
warned that without a constructive response from the West to its demands on
European security, it will act to protect its national security and ensure a
strategic balance, according to Reuters. After tense discussions in Geneva
between the US deputy secretary of state Wendy Sherman and Russia’s deputy
foreign minister Sergei Ryabkov, on Wednesday in Brussels NATO and Moscow found
that deep differences remain between their views on security in Europe. The
West sees Moscow’s mass deployment of troops near the Ukrainian border as an
indication of an impending attack on that country, a plan that Russia denies. NATO’s
secretary general, Jens Stoltenberg, said there is a real risk for a new
armed conflict in Europe, and added that it is up to Russia to
de-escalate and end the crisis.

Tennis. The
Romanian players taking part in the Australian Open, due to begin on Monday, have
found out their opponents. In the first round, world no. 15 and 2018 finalist Simona
Halep will be playing Poland’s Magdalena Frech; world no. 38 Sorana Cîrstea
will have a difficult match against world no. 21 Petra Kvitova; Irina Begu will
be playing France’s Oceane Dodin; Jaqueline Cristian will be facing Greet
Minnen of Belgium in her first match at the Australian Open; and Gabriela Ruse,
also for the first time in Melbourne, will be playing Italy’s Jasmine Paolini. (CM)