EU seals Covid relief deal
BREAKTHROUGH Leaders hope €750bn Covid-recovery package, €1.1tn 2021-2017 budget will help end recession
BRUSSELS/BEIJING:EUROPEAN Union leaders clinched a “historic” deal on a massive stimulus plan for their pandemic-hit economies in the early hours of Tuesday, after a fractious summit that lasted almost five days.
The agreement paves the way for the European Commission, the EU’S executive, to raise billions of euros on capital markets on behalf of all 27 states.
Summit chairman Charles Michel called the accord, reached at a 5.15am local time in Brussels, “a pivotal moment” for Europe. “This agreement sends a concrete signal that Europe is a force for action,” Michel told reporters.
French President Emmanuel Macron, who spearheaded a push for the deal with German Chancellor Angela Merkel, hailed it as “truly historic”.
Leaders hope the €750 billion ($857.33bn) recovery fund and its €1.1 trillion ($1.26tn) 2021-2017 budget will help end the continent’s deepest recession since
World War II after the coronavirus outbreak shut down economies in the bloc. But the summit also exposed fault lines across the bloc that are likely to hinder future decision-making on money, as richer northern countries resisted helping out the poorer nations in the south.
FLYERS MUST HAVE -VE TEST REPORTS: CHINA
Passengers on China-bound flights will need to carry a negative Covid-19 test report, the country’s civil aviation authority said on Tuesday as the government tightens measures to control “imported” infections.
The nucleic acid tests would have to be carried out within five days before the scheduled flight at institutes vetted by Chinese embassies in the host countries.
The new rule will apply to both Chinese citizens as well as foreigners travelling to China from abroad.