Japan to bar new foreign arrivals over Omicron COVID-19 variant
29 November, 2021
Japan will reinstate tough border measures, barring all new foreign arrivals over the Omicron COVID-19 variant, Prime Minister Fumio Kishida announced on Monday (Nov 29), just weeks after a softening of strict entry rules.
"We will ban the (new) entry of foreigners from around the world starting from November 30th," Kishida told reporters, in a decision that reverses a measure to allow some business travellers and students into Japan.
Japanese citizens returning from a number of specified nations can enter but will have to quarantine in designated facilities, the prime minister said.
Japan's borders have been almost entirely shut to new overseas visitors for most of the pandemic, with even foreign residents at one point unable to enter the country.
In early November, the government announced it would finally allow some short-term business travellers, foreign students and other visa holders to enter the country, while continuing to bar tourists.
More countries have imposed travel restrictions to try to seal themselves off as the coronavirus variant spread around the world, with new cases found in the Netherlands, Denmark and Australia.
Japan had already announced it would require travellers permitted to enter Japan from nine southern African countries to quarantine in government-designated facilities for 10 days on arrival.
That measure affects travellers coming from South Africa and neighbouring Namibia, Lesotho, Eswatini, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Zambia, Malawi and Mozambique.
Kishida said Monday that further quarantine restrictions would be imposed on arrivals from an additional 14 countries where the variant has been detected, without giving further details.
Japan has recorded just over 18,300 coronavirus deaths during the pandemic, while avoiding tough lockdowns. After a slow start, the country's vaccination programme picked up speed, with 76.5 per cent of the population now fully inoculated.
The World Health Organization (WHO) said understanding the level of severity of Omicron "will take days to several weeks".
Source: www.channelnewsasia.com