Saudi Arabia imposes travel restrictions on 16 countries amid fresh COVID-19 outbreak

As many global nations confront yet another wave of COVID-19 due to Omicron's sub-variants, Saudi Arabia on Sunday, May 23, imposed a ban on travel to 16 countries including India, Lebanon, Syria, Turkey, Iran, Afghanistan, Yemen, Somalia, Ethiopia, the Democratic Republic of the Congo, Libya, Indonesia, Vietnam, Armenia, Belarus and Venezuela, as per the reports of Gulf News.

General Directorate of Passports of the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia announced that apart from these 16 countries, Saudi nationals who wish to travel to non-Arab nations must have a passport valid for more than six months. It further added that for the journey to Arab countries, the passport should have a validity of at least three months, according to Saudi Gazette. It also announced that citizens travelling to other Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) countries must have a national ID card that is valid for at least three months. For travel, the original ID card and family registry are mandated.

General Directorate of Passports also stressed that Saudis travelling outside the Kingdom must be inoculated with three doses of the COVID-19 vaccine. Children aged 16 and 12 must receive two doses of the vaccination. Exemptions will be granted to those groups who have been granted an exception for medical reasons.

Earlier on May 17, medical officials in Saudi Arabia reported 621 new instances of COVID-19, bringing the surge of COVID-19 cases to a high once more. Turkey is also on the list of countries to which Saudi nationals are not permitted to travel. Saudi Airlines resumed commercial flights to Istanbul, Turkey at the beginning of this month, after a nearly two-year hiatus due to restrictions imposed to combat the spread of COVID-19.

No monkeypox in Saudi Arabia

In the meantime, the World Health Organization (WHO) has confirmed 80 cases of monkeypox in 11 countries and is seeking to better comprehend the outbreak's scope and source. The Saudi Ministry of Health has assured the public that no cases of monkeypox have been identified in the nation as of yet. Abdullah Asiri, the Kingdom's Deputy Minister of Health for Preventive Health stated that the Kingdom has the ability to monitor and detect any potential monkeypox cases as well as fight the infection if a new case occurs.

Image: AP/ Shutterstock