On 6 January, thirteen foreign ministers of the European Union (EU) countries called on the European Commission to develop a simplified mechanism for access to western vaccines against Covid-19 for the states of the Eastern Partnership program (EaP; Armenia, Azerbaijan, Georgia, Belarus, Moldova and Ukraine) as a “strong signal of support for partner states” for the summit of this program, scheduled for spring 2021.
“We urge the European Commission to quickly develop a support mechanism similar to the one already launched to supply vaccines in the Western Balkans. By the upcoming Eastern Partnership Summit, we must send a strong and coordinated signal of the strategic importance of this program. Facilitated access to vaccines from coronavirus will become an important component of this signal. We are confident that these actions will be highly appreciated by the governments and civil societies of these states and will increase the geopolitical role of the European Union in the world. Providing simplified access to vaccines as soon as the EU countries receive the required number of doses is an important instrument of diplomatic influence today. We consider it necessary to use it as widely as possible,” the statement of the foreign ministers from Bulgaria, Croatia, Czechia, Denmark, Finland, Estonia, Hungary, Latvia, Lithuania, Poland, Romania, Slovakia and Sweden.
The European Organisation for the Safety of Air Navigation, commonly known as Eurocontrol, published their Think Paper entitled “What Covid-19 did to European Aviation in 2020, and Outlook for 2021,” highlighting the losses of European aviation during the pandemic. The headline impacts to European aviation during the pandemic were: 1) 56.2 billion losses for airlines, airports air navigation service providers; 2) 1.7 billion fewer passengers; 3) 6.1 million fewer flights, 55% down in 2019, and 4) 51% of all aircraft grounded at year-end. The paper predicted that 2021 traffic would recover to 51% of 2019 volumes, with the recovery gathering pace from the summer onwards as vaccine rollouts take effect.
Amongst those countries which suffered heavily from the drop of air traffic were Armenia and Georgia. According to the Think Paper, Georgia’s flights decreased by 73% which was 34,000 flights, while Armenia’s flights decreased by 63%, which was around 17,000 flights in total. Other countries which have significantly decreased in the number of flights were Israel (- 68%, - 120,000 flights) and Morocco (- 65%, - 131,000 flights). Eurocontrol also wrote that unlike other European states, Georgia, Israel and Morocco did not see a significant recovery during the summer. No data on flights to Azerbaijan was published in the think paper.
