Morocco to ban travellers from China from Tuesday (Jan 3) onwards

ANKARA, Jan 1 (Bernama): Morocco will impose an entry ban on travellers from China beginning Jan 3 due to rising Covid-19 cases, the Foreign Ministry said Saturday.

"The Moroccan Authorities decided to prohibit access to the territory of Morocco to all travellers, regardless of their nationality, coming from China," Anadolu Agency quoted the ministry as saying in a statement.

The decision was taken to avoid a new wave of contaminations in the country, it said.

Meanwhile, Canada announced Saturday it will ask passengers coming from China, Hong Kong and Macao to submit temporary negative Covid-19 tests ahead of their flights to the country.

The Canadian Health Ministry said all air travellers from those locations "will need to provide evidence of a negative Covid-19 test result, taken no more than two days before their departure, to the airline prior to boarding."

The requirement for travellers two years or older will take effect Jan 5. The measure will be in place for 30 days and authorities will reassess it as more data and evidence becomes available.

The decision comes after a surge in cases and "limited epidemiological and viral genomic sequence data available on these cases," it said.

The move came amid fresh announcements by the United States, the United Kingdom, Japan, Italy and Spain that they will enforce new travel requirements for people from China, including negative Covid-19 test results.

China recently announced it would begin to ease pandemic measures, the last biggest economy to opt for "living with COVID" following three years of lockdowns, closed borders and mandatory quarantine.

Since the decision, an unprecedented number of people in China have been infected daily. - Bernama