March 8, 2022

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Newsroom, 08.03.2022, 13:55

COVID-19 Today is the last day
of the COVID-19 state of alert in Romania. The epidemic sees a declining trend
across the country, with the 5th wave of the pandemic close to the
end, president Klaus Iohannis said last week. Romania was on alert for nearly 2
years, beginning on May 15, 2020. Five pandemic waves hit the country during
this period, triggering protection measures, some of which will be lifted once
the state of alert has come to an end. Over these 2 years, says the Strategic
Communication Group, some 64,000 SARS-CoV-2 patients died in Romania. By
Monday, the country had seen roughly 2.78 million infection cases. The number
of new cases reported on Tuesday for the past 24 hours is around 5,500, with 101 related fatalities also
registered, 4 of them from a previous date.

UKRAINE Russia
has sent to Ukraine most of the forces it had deployed along the borders, with
a majority of the 150,000 Russian troops currently on Ukrainian territory, the
Pentagon says. On Tuesday, the 13th day of war, the Russian
offensive focuses on the capital Kyiv in the north and in the south, where
Moscow seeks control over the Black Sea and Sea of Azov coasts. Russian ships
have changed position and are preparing a rocket attack on Odessa, Radio
Romania’s correspondent in the region reports, and mentions that local
authorities continue to urge citizens to leave the city, which is believed to
be a strategic target for the Russian invasion. Meanwhile, a new ceasefire
attempt has been announced for this morning, to enable civilians to leave
several cities that are under attack, including the capital Kyiv, where a
Russian attack is expected in the coming days. President Zelensky accused the
Russian army of preventing the evacuation of civilians, while the West
described Russia’s offer to secure humanitarian corridors only to Belarus and
Russia as cynical. Adjusting the corridors and their logistics was announced
last night, after the 3rd round of Russian-Ukrainian negotiations in
Belarus. Fresh talks are planned for the coming days, without an exact date
announced as yet. On Thursday, a meeting is scheduled in Antalya, Turkey, between
the Russian and Ukrainian foreign ministers, also attended by Turkey’s
diplomacy chief and mediated by the president of Turkey, Recep Tayyip Erdogan. The
UN has also called for corridors in the Ukrainian battle zones, to deliver aid
to the civilians struggling with substantial shortages.

REFUGEES Nearly 30,000 Ukrainian nationals entered Romania in
the past 24 hours, according to the Romanian border police. Since the start of
the crisis a total of around 300,000 Ukrainian citizens have entered Romania.
Bucharest approved on Monday a new set of measures to support the refugees
coming from the neighbouring country, both children and adults, whose rights
the Romanian government will fully observe. The Ukrainian children in Romania
will have access to education at the same standards as Romanian children, the
elderly and the disabled will be able to request social services, and people
seeking a job here will be able to get employed.

RESOURCES The price of all raw materials has soared
around the world since the start of the war in Ukraine and in the context of
the sanctions against Russia. The most substantial price rises were reported
for natural gas, wheat, oil and uranium. Romania will have no natural gas
shortages if Russian imports are cut, and stocks will be restored this spring,
the authorities say. The energy minister Virgil Popescu says Romania has
alternative sources. According to analysts, Romania should begin storing
natural gas as soon as possible, and it should also move to increase the local
output.

STEEL The Târgovişte Special Steel Works in southern Romania
has been taken over by the Italian group Beltrame, one of the world’s leaders
in steel flat bars, local authorities have announced. According to the
investor, apart from revamping the plant, this year 200 new jobs will be
created, followed by another 1,000 in the next 5 years. The steel works,
privatised in 2002, was held by the Russian group Mechel, but was declared
bankrupt last year.

WOMEN
The rights of women and girls have been subject to alarming pressures over the
past year, Amnesty International warns. Events in 2021 and in the early months
of 2022 have conspired to crush the rights and dignity of millions of women and
girls, said Amnesty International secretary general Agnes Callamard. In a
statement posted on International Women’s Day, Callamard pointed out that the
COVID-19 pandemic and the rollback on women’s rights in Afghanistan were among
the developments that had a disproportionate impact on the rights of women and
girls. She also listed in this respect the widespread sexual violence
characterizing the conflict in Ethiopia, attacks on abortion access in the US
and Turkey’s withdrawal from the landmark Istanbul Convention on Gender Based
Violence,” and called on governments to revoke the decisions that have
worsened the situation of women and girls. (A.M.P.)