After two months of State of Emergency, the State of Alert was declared for a period of 30 days starting on May 18^th by Government Decision no. 394/2020 (the “GD“) and subsequently prolonged by Government Decision no. 476/2020 for another 30 days until July 16^th.

The initial rules established a series of restrictions for air, road and rail traffic during the State of Alert. I.e. Air traffic to and from countries from the “red zone” of the pandemic risk (Austria, Germany, UK, France, Switzerland, Italy, Spain, Turkey, Iran, USA, etc.) was suspended. Some expressly regulated exceptions to this relate to goods, mail, health personnel and humanitarian transports.

1. Entry in Romania

On the one hand, foreign nationals (i.e. persons without the citizenship of Romania, of another member state of the European Union or the European Economic Area or Switzerland) and stateless persons were prohibited from entering Romania, with a few express and limited exceptions.

On the other hand, incoming travelers (regardless of whether they are Romanian, EU/ EEA or Swiss citizens) were obliged to go into voluntary isolation / quarantine at their own place of residence / accommodation for 14 days. Exceptions applied for representatives of foreign companies which had subsidiaries/ branches/ representations in Romania, provided that they (i) had no symptoms associated with COVID-19 upon entry and (ii) they had contractual relationships with the above economic units in Romania.

As of June 15^th, 2020, the quarantine and self-isolation obligation for asymptomatic incoming travelers from certain countries was abolished under specific circumstances. The list of “Exempted Countries” is updated weekly (every Monday until 4:00 p.m. and published under https://www.cnscbt.ro/index.php/liste-zone-afectate-covid-19) based on the disease data, and published on the homepage of the National Institute for Public Health; the version as of 22.06.2020 can be found here: https://www.cnscbt.ro/index.php/liste-zone-afectate-covid-19/1823-lista-statelor-exceptate-de-la-masura-de-carantina-22-06-2020/file. These are currently: Austria, Bulgaria, Czech Republic, Cyprus, Croatia, Switzerland, Estonia, Finland, the European territory of France, Germany (excluding Gütersloh), Greece, Ireland, Iceland, Itlay, Latvia, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Malta, Norway, Slovakia, Slovenia and Hungary.

All other travelers (regardless of the country of departure) are still obliged to self-isolate at the specified place of residence or accommodation after entering Romania.

2. Free Movement in Romania

Travelling outside the city limits and the metropolitan area (according to the authorities, basically 30 km outside the city, with Bucharest and Ilfov counting as one metropolitan area) was prohibited with a few expressly provided exceptions, i.e. travelling in professional interest, for the maintenance of real estate in other cities or for sports and leisure activities in groups of up to 3 people. All restrictions have been lifted as of June 1^st.

Interestingly, the restriction to travel in groups of more 6 pedestrians within cities/towns is still applicable.

For more details check on our website [https://stalfort.ro/wp-content/uploads/2020/06/20200615_NEWSFLASH_Entry_in_Romania_as_of_June_15th-FOLLOW-UP.pdf]