Cyprus Mail 9 September 2020 - by Evie Andreou
Turkish Cypriots will temporarily halt inbound flights to the north citing inadequate quarantine space for arriving passengers, Yeni Duzen news portal reported on Wednesday.
The temporary arrangement is slated to be in effect from Wednesday evening.
Turkish Cypriot news portal Yeni Duzen quoted ‘deputy prime minister’ Kudret Ozersay saying the decision was taken because there is no more space in the quarantine places.
Turkish Cypriot authorities require people arriving from category B countries to quarantine for seven days, and people from category C countries for 14 days. People testing positive to coronavirus are also quarantined as are their contacts. These people stay in hotels monitored by authorities.
Ozersay told the news portal that there are around 400 to 450 people at the moment in these hotels. He also said that for every person testing positive, they also send to these hotels between 10 to 15 of their contacts.
The north has seen a steep rise in coronavirus cases in recent days. On Tuesday, 38 new cases were announced, the highest daily figure so far, with 15 of them being local and 19 being contacts of people who already tested positive and are in quarantine. The remainder are people who arrived from abroad.
Ozersay said it was more important to focus on the internal situation and for that reason it was deemed necessary to temporarily halt inbound flights to the north.
No information was given as yet as to how long this measure will remain in place.