Entry of foreigners will be ban from November 30th," Japan's PM
Tokyo: Prime Minister Fumio Kishida announced on Monday, 29 November 2021, that Japan will reinstate tough border measures, barring all new foreign arrivals over the Omicron Covid variant, just a few weeks after a leniency in entry rules.
PM Kishida told reporters, "We will ban the new arrival of foreigners from around the world starting from November 30th."
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 due to the new Covid variant.
Initially in November, the government announced it would finally allow some short-term business travellers, foreign students and other visa holders to enter the country.
Japan had already announced it would require travellers permitted to enter Japan from nine southern African countries to quarantine in government-designated facilities for at least 10 days on arrival.
That measure affects travellers coming from South Africa and neighbouring Namibia, Lesotho, Eswatini, Zimbabwe, Botswana, Zambia, Malawi and Mozambique.
On Monday Kishida said that further quarantine restrictions would be imposed on arrivals from an additional 14 countries where the variant has been detected, without giving further details to the reporters.
18,300 coronavirus deaths have been recorded in Japan during the pandemic, when tough lockdowns were avoided. After a slow start, the country's vaccination programme accelerated, with 76.5 percent of the population now fully inoculated.
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