The Philippine government has extended the travel ban imposed on the United Arab Emirates and nine other countries until August 31.
“President Rodrigo Roa Duterte approved the recommendation of the Inter-Agency Task Force (IATF) to extend the current travel restrictions in India, Pakistan, Bangladesh, Sri Lanka, Nepal, United Arab Emirates, Oman, Thailand, Malaysia and Indonesia from August 16 to August 31, 2021,” Presidential Spokesperson Harry Roque said in a statement.
This is the seventh extension of the travel restrictions imposed to curb the spread of the Delta COVID-19 variant.
The Department of Foreign Affairs (DFA) said they will bring home 7,060 stranded overseas Filipinos in August through special chartered and bayanihan flights.
In a virtual briefing, the DFA said 4,260 Filipinos will be joining the DFA special chartered flight while around 2,800 will be part of the Bayanihan flights.
DFA Undersecretary Sarah Arriola said that the repatriates will be coming from different countries and not only from areas under the travel ban.
“Not only from restricted countries. From countries where there are stranded Filipinos like Saudi Arabia and Qatar,” she said in a tweet.
Arriola said the government has repatriated 408,911 OFWs since February 2020.
“Inuuwi ng DFA ay ‘yung most vulnerable, ‘yung mga taong may pamilyang may bata. More than half are those whose contracts, visas have expired and they have no other means to renew their visas,” she said.
