Poverty-stricken Romania looks to have logged the EU's highest economic growth rate in 2016, official data showed Tuesday even as anti-government protests entered a third week. Gross domestic product expanded 4.8 per cent, the preliminary figures showed, the fastest since it 2008 when it grew by 8.5 per cent before the global financial crisis ushered in a severe recession.
Analysts say the latest figures, which are in line with expectations, should see Romania come ahead of the other 27 member states, some of which have yet to release their data. Romania's economy was boosted last January after the government lowered its value-added tax from 24 percent to 20 percent, which in turn encouraged private spending.
But the second-poorest nation in the European Union, after Bulgaria, is currently facing one of its biggest crises since the ousting and summary execution of communist dictator Nicolae Ceausescu in 1989.
Thousands of people have taken to the streets daily for the past two weeks after the left-wing government tried to water down anti-corruption laws with an emergency decree in late January. Although the decree was revoked as an estimated half a million people protested nation-wide on February 5, the rallies have continued, with many people calling for the government to resign.
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