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Prince Albert II supports the European Unions initiative to provide a global response to the fight against the Covid-19 pandemic.

On Monday, May 4, 2020, the European Union, associated with various international partners, organized online an International Conference of donors the global response to the coronavirus. This was in response to the joint call launched by the World Health Organization (WHO) and global players in the health field to allow rapid and equitable access to screening tests, treatments and vaccines against the coronavirus.

HSH Prince Albert II supported this initiative alongside numerous Heads of State and Governments*,including in particular French President E. Macron, German Chancellor A. Merkel, Prime Ministers of Japan S. Abe, of Canada J. Trudeau, of the United Kingdom B. Johnson, of Israel B. Netanyahu, and the President of the Italian Council G. Conte.

Participating in this online conference through a video message, His Excellency the Sovereign Prince recalled that the Principality has always held its place in the concert of Nations in the humanitarian fields where international solidarity is manifested.

This is the reason why the Principality of Monaco, in solidarity, undertakes to contribute to this common effort.

He also stressed the vital importance of ensuring equitable access to essential medical technologies for the fight against the virus for all, through mobilization on a global scale.

I am convinced that it is only together and united that we will be able to overcome this ordeal which, in our recent history, has no equivalent. Together and united, we will also have the opportunity to steer the future towards a more sustainable and inclusive path.

Donations raised by the European Union, which aim to reach 7.5 billion euros by the end of May, will be used to refine and develop effective diagnostics, treatments and a vaccine available worldwide for an affordable price.

On the evening of May 4, the European Union declared that it had already raised 7.4 billion euros in the form of pledges.

Part of the funds collected by Monaco will more specifically support the actions of GAVI (Global Alliance for Vaccines and Immunization) with which the Monegasque Cooperation has been collaborating for many years.

* List of Countries

Norway, Spain, Saudi Arabia, Jordan, South Africa, Turkey, Switzerland, Netherlands, Luxembourg, Sweden, Portugal, Croatia, Estonia, Bulgaria, Ireland, Serbia, Czech Republic, Hungary, Poland, Australia, Denmark, Greece , Austria, Malta, Belgium, Latvia, South Korea, Mexico, Kuwait, Slovenia, Lithuania, Oman, Finland, Romania, China, United Arab Emirates.

Find the full video message of H.S.H. Prince Albert II on the Facebook page of the Princes Palace:

Corona Global Response

Aujourdhui, lundi 4 mai 2020, la Principaut de Monaco a dcid de participer lappel aux dons lanc par lUnion europenne afin dapporter une rponse mondiale la lutte contre la pandmie Covid-19. Aussi, S.A.S. le Prince Albert a enregistr ce jour un message video rpondant cet appel aux dons et apportant, aux cts de nombreux Chefs d'Etat et de Gouvernement, son soutien dans sa dmarche Mme Ursula Von der Leyen, Prsidente de la Commission europenne. Les fonds recueillis par lUnion europenne, dont lobjectif est datteindre 7,5 milliards deuros, serviront mettre au point et fournir des diagnostics, des traitements et un vaccin efficaces et disponibles sur lensemble de la plante pour un prix abordable.

Posted by Palais Princier de Monaco Prince's Palace of Monaco on Esmaspev, 4. mai 2020

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The Principality supports the European Union initiative against Covid-19 which raises 7.5 billion euros - Hello Monaco!

Yangon, 09/05/2020 - 00:31, UNIQUE ID: 200509_8

At the occasion of Europe Day on 9 May, European Union (EU) Ambassador Kristian Schmidt handed over food, personal hygiene and household products to nurses and doctors at two government hospitals where COVID-19 patients are treated.

The health workers are the real heroes at the frontline of our joint fight against the coronavirus pandemic. Their great courage and dedicated service are admirable. We are immensely thankful for their important service, and we hope with these items we can support the health workers and their families in these difficult times, said Ambassador Schmidt.

The EU donated food, washing powder, soap and other personal hygiene and household products to 550 health workers at the hospitals in Wai Bar Gyi and South Okkapala.

The EU has recently mobilised more than 350 million (526.2 billion kyats) to assist the ASEAN region in the fight against COVID-19. In Myanmar, many of the EUs development programmes have adapted their activities to support the government and civil society in raising awareness about the virus and necessary measures to prevent its further spread, and in distributing hygiene and personal protection equipment. A 5 million (7.9 billion kyats) EU Myan Ku emergency cash fund assists garment workers who lost their jobs over the coronavirus crisis. In cooperation with the French Development Agency, the EU supports the National Health Laboratory - a key part of Myanmars COVID-19 response to increase its testing capacities and preparedness for this and future epidemics. More information about the EUs assistance to Myanmar in responding to COVID-19 can be found here.

Author

Press and Information Team of the Delegation to MyanmarPress and Information

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EU Ambassador marks Europe Day in Myanmar with donation to health workers - Myanmar - ReliefWeb

The Sarajevo City Hall was illuminated on Saturday night in the colors of the flags of the European Union and Bosnia and Herzegovina, on the occasion of May 9, Europe Day.

The city administration reminds that it has already become a tradition to mark Europe Day and Victory Day over fascism with concerts.

Thus, on the anniversary of the opening in 2015, a concert of the Vienna Philharmonic, one of the most famous Austrian and world orchestras today, was organized.

Tonight, from the same place, our Amira Medunjanin gave us an unforgettable evening and for who knows how many times, confirmed that music is a powerful tool in connecting people, erasing borders and spreading love and peace, and our architectural gem shone in the colors of the European Union flag. The City of Sarajevo and Bosnia and Herzegovina, in cooperation with the EU Delegation to BiH, sent another strong message of unity and solidarity, it was said from the city administration.

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City Hall illuminated with Colours of EU and Bosnia and Herzegovina - Sarajevo Times

BRUSSELS The good news for Europe is that the worst of the pandemic is beginning to ease. This week deaths in Italy hit a nearly two-month low. And the German leader Angela Merkel announced that schools, day care centers and restaurants would reopen in the next few days.

But the relief could be short-lived.

The European Commission released projections on Wednesday that Europes economy will shrink by 7.4 percent this year. A top official told residents of the European Union, first formed in the aftermath of the Second World War, to expect the deepest economic recession in its history.

To put this figure in perspective, the 27-nation blocs economy had been predicted to grow by 1.2 percent this year. In 2009, at the back of the global financial crisis, it shrank by 4.5 percent.

Its a grim reminder that even if the virus dissipates, the economic fallout could pressure the world economy for months, if not years.

In China, where the outbreak has subsided in recent weeks, the factories that power the global supply chain have been fired up. But with few global buyers for its goods, its economy has been slow to recover.

In the United States, where the growth of new cases in the hardest-hit areas shows signs of slowing and there is a push to lift lockdowns, there are also signs that a recovery may be elusive. The government on Friday is set to release the monthly employment report, and some forecasts predict a loss of more than 20 million jobs in April a number that would wipe out a decades worth of job gains.

A prolonged European recession, a second wave of the virus or an anemic economic recovery would spell added misery for many Europeans, and hurt companies, banks and people the world over. The crisis is also reigniting political divisions between a wealthier north and a poorer south, threatening to break the brittle balance between divergent nations with inextricably linked economies.

A recovery will probably start unevenly in the second half of the year, Paolo Gentiloni, European commissioner for economy, said at a news conference after the release of the forecast, which comes out four times a year. But by the end of 2021 the countries of the European Union will be in worse shape than they were just two months ago, before the coronavirus started ripping through the continent. U.S. gross domestic product fell at a 4.8 percent annual rate in the first three months of the year, and some economists believe it will contract at an annual rate of 30 percent or more in the current quarter.

The danger of a deeper and more protracted recession is very real, the head of the commissions economic unit, Maarten Verwey, said in the forecasts foreword.

A resurgence of the virus after the end of lockdowns would shave a further 3 percentage points off economic performance this year, he said.

The economies of Italy and Spain, two of the countries hardest hit by the disease, will most likely shrink by over 9 percent each this year, and Italys economy will be particularly slow to recover, Mr. Gentiloni said.

Greece, which had started turning a corner after a decade of economic calamity, will be worst-hit in the union, according to the forecasts, losing 9.7 of its economic output this year. Poland would suffer the least, with a 4.5 percent recession.

And unemployment will most likely average 9 percent in the bloc, the European Commission said, from 6.7 percent the year before.

The blocs biggest economy, Germany, will also be hammered, suffering its worst recession since World War II, set to shrink by 6.5 percent, but it is expected to recover relatively quickly. France, the second-largest economy, is expected to contract 8.5 percent this year.

The severe downturn in Europe will have major repercussions for United States growth and jobs because the two economies are intimately connected.

The European Union and the United States are each others largest trading partners, exchanging goods and services worth $1.3 trillion last year. European companies like Daimler, BMW or Siemens employ more than four million people in the United States, according to U.S. government figures.

China will also suffer. The European Union is second only to the United States as a customer for Chinese goods.

As grim as the economic outlook appears, the greater danger to the world economy may be the risk that the euro common currency could be undermined by the deepening rifts between its members and their leaders. That almost happened in the early years of the last decade, but was averted when the European Central Bank, the euros Federal Reserve, used its monetary firepower to prevent Greece, Italy and Spain from becoming insolvent.

The central bank is again flooding the eurozone with credit and buying the bonds of eurozone governments to keep their borrowing costs from spinning out of control. But the central banks ability to rescue the euro again may be constrained after a ruling Tuesday by Germanys highest court.

The German Constitutional Court issued an ultimatum to the European Central Bank, saying it must show that the side effects of the bond buying do not outweigh the economic benefits. The court threatened to bar Germanys central bank, the Bundesbank, from taking part in the stimulus program, which would be a serious breach of European unity.

The coronavirus is already producing an economic shock in Europe more severe than the one that followed the financial crisis in 2008.

It is clearly more massive, and it is going down more steeply, Clemens Fuest, the president of the Ifo Institute, one of Germanys leading economic think tanks, said during an online presentation Wednesday.

The pandemic could have ramifications for politics and society that are impossible to predict. The economic dislocation caused by the 2008 financial crisis helped fuel far-right populist movements in Germany, Italy and France.

Europes best hope is that economies will bounce back quickly, in what economists optimistically call a V-shaped recession, as lockdowns are eased.

Already, factories have resumed production in much of Italy, and Germany this week allowed hairdressers to begin receiving customers again. France will begin gradually ending its lockdown next week.

But many restrictions remain, including bans on large public gatherings. And no one knows yet whether the virus will reappear with a vengeance as public life resumes.

The fresh set of figures will pile pressure on European leaders to conjure up a brave joint response to the recession to ensure the recovery isnt lopsided, hurting the joint currency and spawning more political unrest in the weaker economies.

Although the leaders have approved a half-trillion euros worth of measures that effectively call on wealthier nations to subsidize the recovery of worse-hit poorer ones, they have been criticized for not going far enough.

The persistent divide poses a threat to the single market and the euro area yet it can be mitigated through decisive, joint European action, Mr. Gentiloni said.

Matina Stevis-Gridneff reported from Brussels, and Jack Ewing from Frankfurt.

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E.U. Is Facing Its Worst Recession Ever. Watch Out, World. - The New York Times

There are two things a quarantined European will reliably find when he goes online for news in this age of the coronavirus: first, the clucking of local pundits at how the Trump administration has managed the epidemic in the United States; second, unmistakable evidence that every one of the major countries of Western Europe, with the exception of Angela Merkels Germany, is doing worse.

The coronavirus epidemic has turned Europeans against one another. In early March, Germany, one of the few countries with the manufacturing capacity to equip its citizens with medical masks, canceled plans to export protective gear. This infuriated Italy, which was then at the most desperate stage of its own epidemic. Italy in turn became the scapegoat in a wave of Spanish newspaper storiesabout various Iberian fashionistas who had brought Covid-19 back from Milans Fashion Week (also canceled, but too tardily); about Venices Carnival (halted, but only once it was underway); and about the Valencia fans who fell sick after traveling to Milan for a Champions League soccer match against Atalanta, the team of the heavily infected Italian city of Bergamo.

In Barcelona, Quim Torra, president of the autonomous (and nationalist) government of Catalonia, sought to close off the border between his region and the rest of Spain. He failed. Spains politically vulnerable Socialist prime minister, Pedro Snchez, sniffing a stratagem for Catalan independence, soughtand gota centralization of emergency authority in Madrid. The Catalans were left to grumble that they were heading into a plague yoked to Europes least competent government. That, alas, was an accurate assessment of Spain for much of the spring. By the end of April, its death rate had reached 510 per million. But then the virus took off in divided, decadent Belgium, paralyzed by its own subnational power structures. As April turned to May, deaths there reached a world-beating 633 per million, more than three times the American rate. Meanwhile, almost-forgotten border checkpoints had been reestablishedbetween France and Germany, Austria and Italy.

Facing their largest challenge since World War II, Europes countries are performing poorly. The Brussels-based European Union, the one institution with a track record of coordinating emergency responses continentwide, has been casting about aimlessly for a strategy. Right now, Europe needs regulatory harmonizationwhich is just what Brussels is good at providing. But Europe also needs leaders who can boost morale and stir up sentiments of shared sacrificeand these are the specialty of nationalist democracies. Europes nations were built on family ties, regional languages, and horrific wars in which everyone shed blood together. The sense of belonging is emotional, intense. Since its consolidation as a political unit after 1992, the EU has sought to transcend and abolish that kind of emotional kinship in favor of a politics of global capitalism and expert planning. Democratically inclined citizens often find this kind of politics frustrating even when global capitalism and expert planning are working splendidly. Right now, they are not.

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Can the European Union Survive a Pandemic? - The New Republic