Jakarta (AFP)
More than 40,000 workers at a large Chinese industrial complex in Indonesia have been quarantined to prevent the spread of the new coronavirus that has killed more than 200 people in China, the company said on Friday.
The group PT Indonesia Morowali Industrial Park has placed in isolation for the weekend its nickel extraction facilities and its stainless steel factories on the island of Celebes and prevents its employees, numbering 43,000, from entering or to go out without written authorization.
Of some 5,000 Chinese workers at the site, "we have identified and examined migrant workers from Wuhan," group spokesman Dedy Kurniawan told AFP.
No case of infection by the new virus has been detected for the moment, but the group has installed thermal scanners at the entrance of its buildings and prohibited foreigners from entering the site.
The facilities, which occupy some 2,000 hectares, are controlled by the Chinese group Shanghai Decent Investment Group.
Indonesian authorities have yet to confirm any cases of people infected with the virus despite the large number of Chinese tourists and workers passing through its territory.
Indonesia is preparing to evacuate some 240 stranded nationals in the Hubei region, China's epicenter of the epidemic.
© 2020 AFP