BAKU, Azerbaijan, April 4
By Tamilla Mammadova - Trend:
The Georgian government has brought back 4,500 Georgian citizens from different coronavirus-hit countries since COVID-19 outbreak worldwide, Trend reports citing Georgian media.
Georgian Foreign Minister David Zalkaliani said that on April 4, charter flights from Berlin, Warsaw, Athens and Larnaca will bring Georgian citizens back home.
Additional flights will be carried out from Berlin on April 12 and from Amsterdam on April 14.
Zalkaliani noted that additional flights will be implemented from London on April 4.
"The work, organized in full compliance with the requirements of the World Health Organization protocol, will continue step by step," said Zalkaliani.
According to him, Georgian citizens have already returned from Berlin, Vienna and Amsterdam.
"Ninety-two people arrived in Georgia by additional flights from Bulgaria on April 2. On April 3, our citizens returned from Ukraine by ferry”, said Zalkaliani.
Zalkaliani added that Georgia is one of the first countries to start returning its citizens from abroad in the very first days of the coronavirus outbreak, and the work will continue in the future.
The number of COVID-19 cases in Georgia has reached 156 on April 4.
Georgian Health Minister Yekaterina Tikaradze predicts an increase in the number of people infected with coronavirus by the end of April.
According to Tikaradze, it is possible that this number will amount to several hundred infected daily.
On March 21, Georgia declared a state of emergency until April 21 to prevent the spread of coronavirus.
The outbreak in the Chinese city of Wuhan - which is an international transport hub - began at a fish market in late December 2019. Some sources claim the coronavirus outbreak started as early as November 2019.
The World Health Organization (WHO) declared COVID-19 a pandemic on March 11.
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