The full list ended on Friday includes Algeria, Australia, Canada, Georgia, Japan, Montenegro, Morocco, New Zealand, Rwanda, Serbia, South Korea, Thailand, Tunisia, Uruguay, Andorra, San Marino, Monaco and the Vatican. China will be included if it also opens its borders to travelers from the European Union, since reciprocal reopening is one of the criteria used to make the final selection from the safe list.
Britain, despite leaving the EU, is still considered part of the bloc until the end of the year, so it was not part of the discussion about outside visitors.
A detailed guide to criteria shared between diplomats and revised this week by The New York Times said the list should include only countries with a “comparable or better epidemiological situation as the average in the EU + area”, and that data from Those countries must be credible and demonstrate a robust system to contain the virus.
The term “EU +” refers to the European Union plus Norway, Iceland, Switzerland and Lichtenstein, which do not belong to the EU but are normally part of its open border area.
Criteria for safe list exceptions were also detailed in the guide, adding flexibility. These included health workers, diplomats, humanitarian workers, transit passengers, asylum seekers and students, as well as “passengers traveling for imperative family reasons” and foreign workers whose employment in Europe is considered essential.
