President Klaus Iohannis said on Thursday that he cannot accept that the aid given by Romania to Ukraine turns against Romanian farmers, according to Agerpres.
Iohannis requested the government representatives to find the best methods to protect Romania‘s farmers while still helping Ukraine.
The President was asked whether it would be appropriate to ban grain transit from Ukraine or to take other measures, given the protests of Romanian farmers in recent days.
“I was among the first to draw attention to the problem and I managed quite quickly … to initiate the first concrete aid, which was an additional in European money for the compensation of Romanian farmers. But it is too little and much more needs to be done,” stated Iohannis.
“For the first time or exclusively in the CSAT [ the Supreme Council for National Defence] meeting on Tuesday we discussed this issue and I asked the government representatives to find the best methods to correct the situation,” he added.
Iohannis stated that “we are helping Ukraine and we are extremely open, we have facilitated the grain transit, and more than half of what Ukraine has exported has passed through Romania – road, rail, port, so we have exported through Romania a huge quantity, more than 14 million tonnes of cereals, and we will continue to do so.”
“We don’t tax them, we don’t take taxes on that. But this aid is for Ukraine and under no circumstances can we accept to allow it to be turned against Romanian farmers. The best solutions must be found to protect the Romanian farmer and to help Ukraine at the same time,” he explained.
“We support Ukraine with everything we can and everything they need,” said Klaus Iohannis.