The Archbishop of Canterbury has weighed in on the travels bans imposed on several southern African countries, calling them “morally wrong”.
In a series of tweets, Justin Welby called the bans “self defeating”, saying, “We cannot have ‘travel apartheid’” – a phrase used by Nigeria’s high commissioner on Tuesday.
In the past two weeks, the UK government has added 11 countries to the formerly emptied red list, including South Africa, Botswana and most recently Nigeria, meaning expensive hotel quarantine stays for all arrivals from those countries.
Meanwhile countries and regions including the US and EU also banned arrivals from a selection of neighbouring African countries.
Leaders and officials in red-listed countries expressed outrage at the “selective” listing of southern African countries, when omicron is now present in dozens of countries around the world.
In other news, holiday giant Tui today announced losses of £2.01bn (£1.72bn) in the year to September 2021, working out to nearly £5m per day.
However CEO Fritz Joussen remains optimistic, telling The Independent: “We expect summer 2022 to return to booking levels similar to pre-corona 2019.”
Follow all the latest travel updates below:
Significant additions to Eastern European rail network
Rail timetables across Europe change on Sunday 12 December, and the new edition of the European Rail Timetable reveals significant additions in eastern Europe.
The rail link between Odessa in Ukraine and Przemysl in Poland has been reinstated, as well as the international service between Iasi in Romania and Chisinau in Moldova. Between Odessa and Chisinau, trains will run three days a week.
Further north, Allegro express services between St Petersburg and Helsinki will resume with the start of the new timetable, but they will initially only be available to Finnish and Russian citizens.
A train at Chisinau station
(Tony Wheeler)
Simon Calder8 December 2021 11:43
New Covid rules expected but travel restrictions will not change, say sources
Further Covid-related restrictions are to be announced this week, Whitehall sources have told reporters – but travel rules will be kept as they are.
“Two Whitehall sources have told PoliticsHome that additional Covid restrictions are set to be announced as early as today, in response to the rising R rate,” tweeted PoliticsHome reporter Noa Hoffman.
However, she added in a follow up tweet that the UK’s current set of travel rules will be “kept as is”, and “treated separately” from domestic rules and restrictions.
Lucy Thackray8 December 2021 10:44
‘We cannot have ‘travel apartheid’’: Archbishop slams travel bans
The Archbishop of Canterbury has called for the lift of travel bans on certain countries due to the emergence of the omicron variant, saying, “We cannot have ‘travel apartheid’”.
In a series of tweets yesterday afternoon, Justin Welby called the bans on countries such as South Africa and Namibia “morally wrong” and “self defeating”, calling for “vaccine equity” instead of border closures.
“With Omicron set to become the dominant variant in the UK, I appeal to the British government to remove Nigeria and South Africa from the red list – together with all other countries currently on it,” wrote the Archbishop.
Lucy Thackray8 December 2021 09:49
Tui lost £4.7m per day amid 2021 restrictions
Holiday giant Tui has reported a loss of £2.01bn (£1.72bn) for the 12 months to the end of September 2021 – working out to almost £5m per day.
Tui carried only 5.4 million passengers in the past year 2021, less than 20 per cent of 2019 levels. But it already has 4.1 million bookings for the current financial year.
CEO Fritz Joussen told The Independent he was optimistic for the year ahead, saying: “We expect summer 2022 and the peak travel season to return to booking levels similar to pre-corona 2019.”
Simon Calder8 December 2021 09:17
Good morning
Good morning and welcome to The Independent’s travel liveblog, where we’ll be following all the latest news and updates.
Lucy Thackray8 December 2021 09:06
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