Paolo Gentiloni (ANSA / EPA / STEPHANIE LECOCQ / POOL)

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February 26, 2021 "This is not the time to tighten our belts". The European Commissioner for Economic Affairs, Paolo Gentiloni, said this to the microphones of Radio Anch'io on Radio1. "At this moment - he said - we are asking all European countries to support the economy and respond to the crisis because we are not out of it yet". "This - he concluded - does not mean that in the medium term the countries with the highest debt should not be prudent".



"Certainly there is a problem with the production capacity of these vaccines. It is very difficult to produce in the quantities that were promised and we have to demand that these pharmaceutical companies respect the targets they promised. Perhaps there was also here by the Commission. an underestimation of the extent to which these promises by the pharmaceutical companies could have proved not entirely reliable ".  



"That said, it is true we are behind countries that started vaccinations twenty days earlier, namely the United States and Great Britain but we are ahead of countries like Canada, Australia, Japan, South Korea, China and Russia in terms of doses ", specified the former Italian premier. 



"We just need to accelerate rather than question a concept that I believe should remain valid and that is a joint acquisition of vaccines by the European Commission, given that it is 2.6 billion doses". 



"I would have been terrified, in a context in which black markets and parallel markets are unleashed, by a competition between the 27 European countries to grab the official and unofficial doses of the various pharmaceutical companies. A nightmare. Here we are facing a delay and we must remedy this delay. And yesterday the European Council was unanimous on this point ", he added. 



"We do not bring down governments or give birth to governments in Brussels. Surely the previous government, the so-called Conte 2, was a government with a very clear European orientation in very clear discontinuity with respect to the previous government. And everyone in Brussels was aware of this. remarks on the need to strengthen the recovery plan had nothing to do with a prejudicial negative attitude towards the previous government. "



"Having said that, it is clear that Mario Draghi is the personality we know, his authority in Europe can certainly be of help to Italy. And this added value is not free. If the Recovery plan is carried out, implemented in the best possible way, this will give Italy under the Draghi government a truly significant weight in Europe ", added Gentiloni.



By entrusting the management of the national recovery and resilience plan to the Ministry of Economy, Italy has chosen the path of the "majority of EU countries" and, in doing so, "things have started to run in the right direction". 



"Even before they were running in the right direction, but unfortunately there was a break of weeks and weeks - he adds - from the conversations I had with Minister Daniele Franco in these days I know that I am at work, I am in contact with the Commission services ".