BAKU, Azerbaijan, March 18
By Nargiz Sadikhova - Trend:
Flights and railway traffic to Kazakhstan’s Almaty city will completely be suspended due to quarantine regime in the country, city’s Deputy Head Yerlan Kozhagapanov said, Trend reports with reference to Kazakh media.
Kozhagapanov said that the entrance to the city will be closed off at 00:00 (GMT +6) on March 22, 2020, it being the deadline to enter or leave the city after which it will be completely shut off.
Movement of city’s residents and city’s public transport with not be restricted.
“Buses and subway will operate as usual. Due to the decrease of passenger traffic the time distance between means of transport will be increased by 20 percent,” he said.
Kozhagapanov also commented on entrance prohibition.
“The employees required for life support of the city (police, bus drivers, etc.) will temporarily stay in the city. Entrance will be closed for the rest, including residents of the suburbs,” he said.
On March 15, 2020, Kazakhstan’s President Kassym Jomart Tokayev signed a decree introducing an emergency state in Kazakhstan due to coronavirus outbreak, which is relevant from 08:00 (GMT +6) on March 16 till 08:00 on April 15, 2020.
By a decision of State Commission on Provision of Emergency State under the president of Kazakhstan quarantine regime is being introduced at 00:00 (GMT +6) on March 19, 2020 in Kazakhstan’s Nur-Sultan and Almaty cities due to coronavirus outbreak.
On March 13, 2020, first two cases of coronavirus infection were detected in Kazakhstan among those who arrived in Almaty city from Germany.
The outbreak in the Chinese city of Wuhan - which is an international transport hub - began at a fish market in late December 2019. The number of people killed by the disease has surpassed 7,900. Over 198,000 people have been confirmed as infected. Meanwhile, over 81,000 people have reportedly recovered.
Some sources claim the coronavirus outbreak started as early as November 2019.
Several countries are working on a vaccine against the new virus.
The World Health Organization (WHO) on March 11 declared COVID-19 a pandemic.