AirAsia announced on Thursday it would resume flights to Cambodia in January, but Phnom Penh’s airport operator expects arrivals in 2022 to be “far from the prepandemic level of traffic of 2019.”
Prime Minister Hun Sen dropped quarantine requirements and overnight PCR tests upon arrival for all vaccinated travelers from Monday, going beyond Thailand’s reopening to dozens of countries early this month.
Foreign arrivals from select countries and who are sponsored by a local company director or other official have had Covid-19 quarantine requirements relaxed, but “general” foreign and Cambodian arrivals no longer have the option to self-isolate at home for two weeks, according to the Health Ministry’s latest guidelines.
The Cambodian Embassy in Kuala Lumpur has told Cambodian citizens in Malaysia, including 143 people who have been trying to return home since last month, to attain documents certifying they are free of Covid-19 if they wish to be allowed back in the country. But some say they cannot afford to pay for the health reports.
The government on Wednesday lifted a ban on travelers arriving from six countries, four days after the Health Ministry said the last remaining Covid-19 patient of Cambodia’s 122 confirmed cases had recovered from the virus.
The government on Friday eased pandemic-related restrictions on travel, which went into effect overnight Thursday, announcing that movement within provinces and between Phnom Penh and neighboring Kandal would be allowed.
The government on Thursday issued a one-week ban on civilian travel in and out of Phnom Penh, and between districts outside the capital, effective at midnight and aimed at limiting the spread of Covid-19, according to an order from Prime Minister Hun Sen.
Cambodia has aimed and succeeded at wooing Chinese travelers in recent years, but some tourism professionals say that wasn’t the best strategy, even before the Covid-19 outbreak started taking a toll on Siem Reap tourism.
A luxury cruise ship that was turned away by other Asian nations due to fears of coronavirus docked at Cambodia’s Sihanoukville port Thursday evening, with passengers required to undergo health checks before they can disembark, officials said.
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