227 Chinese stranded overseas set to arrive home on Friday night, Beijing says
- Civil aviation authority says it has arranged flights from Thailand, Malaysia to get holidaymakers back to Wuhan
- Preparations also being made to repatriate Chinese stuck in Canada, Singapore, Japan and Myanmar, official says
Both flights are expected to arrive in Wuhan, the capital of central China’s Hubei province, at about 9pm on Friday.
A third, Spring Airlines, flight had also been arranged to take people who had been stranded in Tokyo back to Wuhan. It was expected to arrive early Saturday morning.
CAAC official Zhu Tao told a press conference in Beijing on Thursday that flights had also been arranged for Wuhan residents currently stuck in Singapore, Osaka in Japan, Krabi in Thailand, Mandalay in Myanmar, and elsewhere.
“All of China’s civil airlines are fully prepared and can provide capacity at any time once the needs have been clarified,” he said, without saying when the flights would take off.
Meanwhile, Chinese Foreign Minister Wang Yi said on Friday that flights would also arranged to repatriate Wuhan and Hubei residents currently in Canada.
He made the comment in a phone call with his Canadian counterpart, François-Philippe Champagne, according to details of the conversation published by China’s foreign ministry.
Wang said the fact the CAAC had arranged the flights showed Beijing was taking the matter seriously.
He said also that he hoped Ottawa would not restrict travel or trade between the two countries, and heed the World Health Organisation’s recommendations on how best to manage the situation.
On Monday, the culture and tourism bureau in Wuhan said that 4,096 Wuhan residents were known to be still outside mainland China but planning to return over the coming days.
The city’s mayor, Zhou Xianwang, said last week that about 5 million of the city’s 11 million residents had left before a lockdown was imposed as part of the emergency efforts to contain the spread of the virus.
As several countries, including Germany and the United States, have been working to evacuate their citizens out of Wuhan, some Hubei residents stranded overseas have complained of being unable to get home because of airlines cutting flights and even refusing to let them fly.
On Monday, dozens of Chinese flying from Japan to Shanghai refused to board a plane as it was also set to carry 16 people from Wuhan.
The Shanghainese claimed their countrymen had taken medication to disguise their fever symptoms. The China Southern Airlines from Chubu Centrair International Airport eventually took off five hours late – with everyone on board – after the Chinese consulate general in Nagoya stepped in to mediate.
It recommended that countries help boost research into the new virus, but opposed any move to close borders or restrict travel with China.
In 2014, Beijing arranged for 3,000 Chinese to be evacuated from Vietnam in response to anti-Chinese demonstrations there caused by a dispute over the South China Sea dispute.
A year later, 600 Chinese were evacuated from Yemen amid fighting in the region, while during the Arab spring of 2011, 35,000 Chinese were flown out of the region.
