RABAT, March 15 (NNN-AGENCIES) — Tourists from a number of European countries were unable to leave after flights were suspended to many European countries and also to China and Algeria.
French nationals were allowed to leave on repatriation flights, according to the French Foreign Ministry.
Tourists were stranded in Morocco after the kingdom announced strict border restrictions in response to the coronavirus, leaving travellers stuck at borders, ports and airports.
Morocco suspended air, sea and land links with European countries and Algeria on Friday, as well as taking measures to confine citizens to prevent the spread of coronavirus.
Flights to and from Algeria, Spain, France, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, Portugal and Italy were suspended “until further notice”, while sea links for passengers and Morocco’s land borders with Ceuta and a second Spanish enclave, Melilla, were closed.
But France’s Foreign Minister Jean-Yves Le Drian announced that Rabat had agreed to allow repatriation flights for French nationals.
The first flights back to France took off Saturday, he said.
The closure of the only land border between Africa and the European Union at Cueta and Melilla saw Spaniards rushing to leave on Thursday evening, as Moroccan day workers hastily returned in the opposite direction.
The land borders are busiest in summer, but the traffic never ordinarily stops flowing. Now though a Moroccan police roadblock bars the road towards the border with Cueta.
The border at Cueta, like that at Melilla, was reopened Friday only for Spaniards. Except for a few travellers, the normally busy border post near the Moroccan town of Fnideq was deserted.
Moroccan authorities have reported 17 cases of COVID-19, including one death. France and Spain have together announced more than 210 COVID-19 deaths.
On the Spanish side at Cueta, stuck Moroccans were wondering why their country would not let them back in.
At Tangiers port some 30 kilometres to the west, containers and trucks were unloaded as usual but the passenger terminal was closed.
The busiest port in North Africa, the facility welcomed 568,000 foreign tourists in 2019, while some 473,000 entered from Cueta and Melilla, according to official figures.
The travel restrictions are causing panic in the kingdom’s tourism sector, which accounts for 10 percent of GDP and is a key source of foreign exchange.
