Francis Ogwo
China is to allow more foreign airlines, including American carriers, into the country under a new aviation policy announced on Thursday by Beijing.
The policy which nullifies an earlier ban imposed on March 12 on certain foreign airlines operating into China will now allow them one one international flight per week beginning from Monday.
This is coming a day after Washington ordered the suspension of all Chinese travel into and out of the United States of America.
This new decision by China is coming in the wake of renewed and heightened tension which included series of issues from Donald Trump’s, especially the accusations over China’s handling of the pandemic, Hong Kong and the Huawei controversy.
The recent was the Civil Aviation Authority of China (CAAC) imposing a limit on foreign airlines based on their activity as of March 12. This is because US carriers had suspended all flights, and by that date, their cap was set at zero, while Chinese carriers’ flights to the US continued.
The US had on Wednesday, said it would ban Chinese passenger flights from June 16, which would open another phase of faceoff between the world economic giants.
The world however, woke up on Thursday to the news of the CAAC saying that all foreign airlines excluded in the March 12 order would now be able to operate one international route into China each week.
There have been obvious crack in the relations between the US and China recently after Trump accused China of intentionally causing the coronavirus while the recent plan to impose a strict security law on Hong Kong had worsened the tensions.
Recently, the United States imposed restrictions on Chinese telecom giant Huawei with a probe order into the actions of Chinese companies listed on American financial markets.
Beijing had on its part, mocked the US position on Hong Kong in light of civil rights protests which swept across the United States after the recent police killing of George Floyd in Minneapolis and also gradually relaxed strict air travel caps on some foreign firms as the coronavirus outbreak in the country appears to be under control.
China has said that it increase the number of permitted flights to and from China in June following an outcry from stranded Chinese abroad with a fast-tracking of entry procedures for business travellers from several other countries, including Singapore and South Korea.
The CAAC however said that routes with passengers all testing negative for COVID-19 for three consecutive weeks won’t be permitted to operate an additional flight each week and also a suspension of a week of routes with five or more passengers testing positive.
