Australia to ease travel ban in November shedding Hermit Kingdom tag

Joel Carrett EPA-EFE/REX/Shutterstock People looked out over Sydney Harbor on Thursday as a storm brewed over the city.

SYDNEY â€" Australia will drop some restrictions on international travel in November, easing one of the world’s longest covid border closures.

Prime Minister Scott Morrison announced Friday that the country would reopen its mostly shut international border next month, ending more than 18 months of restrictions that earned the Pacific nation the nicknames of “Fortress Australia” and the “Hermit Kingdom,” and left tens of thousands of Australians stuck overseas.

Morrison said fully vaccinated Australians will be able to travel overseas once their state or territory inoculates 80 percent of its eligible population â€" a target some states are on track to hit this month â€" but that unvaccinated Australians will have to wait.

Caps on the number of returning Australians who are vaccinated will be lifted but will remain in place for the unvaccinated, he said. And vaccinated Australians will no longer need to spend two weeks in hotel quarantine upon returning to the country but can instead isolate at home for seven days. Two states have already started home quarantine trials.

[‘Covid hit us like a cyclone’: An Aboriginal town in the Australian Outback is overwhelmed]

Morrison acknowledged that Australians had “suffered” because of the travel restrictions.

“It’s time to give Australians their lives back,” he told reporters, adding that the government was facilitating increased commercial flights home for those stuck overseas. “Australia will be ready for takeoff very soon.”

Morrison did not say when foreigners will be able to visit Australia. A news release said only that the government would “work towards welcoming tourists back to our shores.” But a spokesman for Morrison’s office told The Washington Post that foreigners will be able to visit Australia “before Christmas.”

Morrison also said Australia will recognize the Chinese-made Sinovac vaccine and the India-made Covishield shots for the purposes of allowing returning Australians to quarantine at home.

Australia has been battling an outbreak of the delta variant in recent months that has resulted in widespread lockdowns and largely ended the pursuit of “covid zero” in most of the country.

New South Wales, the most populous state, has led the way toward living with the virus after a rapid increase in vaccination rates and is scheduled to begin reopening on Oct. 11. The state’s premier, Gladys Berejiklian, resigned on Friday in connection with a corruption inquiry, though there was no indication that her departure would jeopardize the reopening plans.

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