European Union Reopens Borders To 15 Nations Including China; India And US Travelers To Miss Out

China has been allowed to let their travelers visit European countries on the condition that that Beijing do the same for Europeans.

Photo: PTI

The European Union on Tuesday agreed upon opening its borders to 15 countries from July 1 but travelers from big countries like United States, Russia, India and Brazil will remain excluded from the list for at least another two weeks due to soaring Coronavirus infections in these countries. According to a report by international news agency Agence France-Presse, China, where the deadly COVID-19 virus first appeared in December last year, was successful in making to the list which will be updates every two weeks. China has been allowed to let their travelers visit European countries on the condition that that Beijing do the same for Europeans. It is surprising that US will miss out from traveling to countries under European Union while its neighbouring Canada, Japan, Australia, New Zealand and Uruguay have been allowed without conditions on the list which was drawn up by diplomats on Friday, but required final approval. Besides there, Algeria, Georgia, Japan, Montenegro, Morocco, Rwanda, Serbia, South Korea, Thailand and Tunisia rounded out the countries, which was agreed to by vote among the EU's 27 member states. Though the list was legally non-binding, the EU said member states "remain responsible for implementing the content of the recommendation. "National authorities "should not decide to lift the travel restrictions... before this has been decided in a coordinated manner," the statement added. The United States is currently the country most affected by COVID-19 with more than 125,000 deaths while daily infection rates in Europe have stabilised.  In March this year, US President Donald Trump had announced suspension of all travel from Europe, excluding the UK, to the US for the 30 days to stop the spread of novel Coronavirus. He said the European Union has "failed to take the same precautions" as his administration had implemented to contain the Coronavirus outbreak.