Ottawa: In the wake of rising coronavirus cases, Canada has suspended all passenger flights from India and Pakistan for 30 days. The restrictions came into effect from 11:30 PM, Thursday (0330 GMT, Friday). The curbs, however, will not apply to cargo flights.
Addressing a press conference, Transportation Minister Omar Alghabra said, “Given the higher number of cases of Covid-19 detected in air passengers arriving in Canada from India and Pakistan… I am suspending all commercial and private passenger flights arriving in Canada from Indian and Pakistan for 30 days.”
“This is a temporary measure, while we assess the evolving situation and determine appropriate measures going forward,” he added. The development comes on a day when India recorded the world’s highest daily tally of 314,835 COVID-19 infections.
Canada is the latest country to impose a travel ban on passengers from India. Earlier, UK, Hong Kong, France had banned flights from India. Earlier this week, UK had added India to its COVID-19 travel “red list”, which effectively bans all travel from the country and makes a 10-day hotel quarantine compulsory for UK residents arriving back to the country.
While Hong Kong banned flights from India for 14 days, Pakistan decided to ban for two weeks travellers coming from India. France has also announced a ban on travel from India from Saturday.
Moreover, the UAE had also banned travel from India for 10 days from Sunday due to the worsening COVID-19 situation in the country. The travel ban will come into effect from 11.59 pm on Saturday, April 24, and is subject to review after 10 days, the Gulf News reported.
Passengers who have transited through India in the last 14 days will also not be permitted to board from any other point to the UAE, the report said. However, departure flights will continue to operate and the ban will not extend to UAE citizens, diplomatic passport holders and official delegations, it added.