UDMR asks cancellation of MAI-BOR agreement on Easter; relaxing restrictions, extremely dangerous

The Hungarian Democratic Union of Romania (UDMR) asks Prime Minister Ludovic Orban to request the Interior Minister to cancel the agreement between the Interior Ministry (MAI) and the Romanian Orthodox Church (BOR), arguing that Marcel Vela "ignores" the state of emergency declared by President Klaus Iohannis, the public health measures imposed by his own Government and, thus, "endangers" the entire country and the safety of the population.

According to a UDMR release sent to AGERPRES on Wednesday, the BOR - the MAI agreement is also "discriminatory" toward the Catholic and Protestant rite believers.

"Through the new decisions announced, the Interior Ministry is basically preparing to cancel all the results obtained so far by introducing the measures to prevent and combat the epidemic. (...) Certainly, relaxing the restrictions is extremely dangerous from the perspective of public health and - after all forecasts - would result in a drastic increase in the number of infections and deaths. Also, the agreement between the MAI and the BOR would diminish the efforts of the last months of a country that is preparing to recover economically in this situation of an unprecedented gravity," the UDMR said.

In the view of Union's representatives, the measures taken "would mean the extension of the state of emergency, maintaining the restrictive measures and delaying the resumption of economic activities."

Minister Marcel Vela announced on Tuesday that he signed a support agreement with BOR Patriarch Daniel for the delivery of the Holy Light on the Orthodox Easter. He also mentioned that believers can come on Friday and Saturday to take the sacramental bread from specially set places outside the churches and that on the sworn statement the people must mention the name of the church in their area of residence.