Ukraine: Covid-19 cases increase, country closes to foreigners

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3 min

Thunderclap in Ukraine where, faced with the resurgence of contamination with the new coronavirus, the authorities took the radical decision to close the country to foreigners. This measure applies since this Friday, August 28. It will last a month and has taken the country by surprise, while the government is multiplying contradictory decisions to deal with the pandemic.

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With our correspondent in Kiev, Stéphane Siohan

For several weeks, around 2,000 people have been infected every day in Ukraine by Covid-19 . A worrying figure, especially if we remember that in the spring, the situation had remained relatively under control. The government therefore decided to act, by prohibiting, from Friday August 28 and for one month, the stay of foreign nationals, except certain categories such as diplomats or humanitarian personnel.

Concern with the situation in Belarus and the Jewish New Year

However, in Kiev, many criticize this radical decision and doubt its impact. Moreover, the government of Volodymyr Zelensky is doing everything to avoid an unpopular reconfinement. The statistics are panicking but the schools are reopening, the barrier gestures are abandoned, and the men of the President of the Republic often use the Coué method in the face of the virus.

In addition, we learned this week that the former Ukrainian Prime Minister, Yulia Tymoshenko, had been hospitalized, contaminated by the coronavirus, as well as all her family. The former face of the 2004 Orange Revolution, aged 59, is in serious condition, according to her press secretary. She was reportedly put on life support.

Closing the borders is also a problem at a time when dozens, if not hundreds, of Belarusian nationals are tempted to come to Ukraine to flee repression . But the government has another concern in mind: indeed, every year in September, tens of thousands of Orthodox Jews come to celebrate Rosh Hashanah, the Jewish New Year, at the tomb of the founder of the Hasidic current. It is quite possible that Kiev and Jerusalem wanted to prevent the Jewish New Year this year from turning into a viral bomb.

► See also: Sharp increase in coronavirus cases in Ukraine

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• Ukraine
• Coronavirus
• Health and medicine
• Volodymyr Zelensky

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