EU summit eyes border closures to curb spread of virus variants

BRUSSELS, January 22 ------ EU leaders discussed tighter travel restrictions for Europe’s internal borders at a virtual summit Thursday as part of efforts to slow and detect the spread of new coronavirus variants. Their gathering came just as the European Centre for Disease Prevention and Control said there was a “very high” probability of strains with much higher infectivity propagating in the 27-country bloc. These mutations — which emerged in Britain, South Africa and Brazil — have already prompted bans or restrictions on travellers from those countries.

Now calls are increasing to also shut internal EU borders to all but essential travel, though German Chancellor Angela Merkel said such a step would be “the last resort”. The goal first is to bring down the high infection rates in all EU countries, she said, noting that “if a country with a rate perhaps twice as high as Germany opens all its shops and we still have them closed, then of course you have a problem”. If that is not possible, border controls “cannot be completely ruled out,” she said. She and other leaders stressed coordination to avoid the experience in March when several member states panicked and closed off national borders unilaterally, triggering travel chaos. That decision came to be seen as disastrous, disrupting the already stumbling European economy, and the leaders will work hard to find ways to thwart the variants while keeping factories and businesses running.

Belgium — wedged between Germany, France and the Netherlands — said it would plead for a “temporary” closure during its February-March holiday period. In an interview with AFP before the summit, Foreign Minister Sophie Wilmes said Belgium wanted to ban “non-essential mobility” outside the country’s borders until at least the end of the February holidays. She added that it would be “peculiar” to keep Belgian bars and restaurants closed but allow tourists to head abroad. Austrian Chancellor Sebastian Kurz said his country supported the German proposals “for stricter entry controls and testing requirements to keep virus mutations out”.

Source: newsinfo.inquirer.net