The Diplomat
The Official State Gazette (BOE) published yesterday the new list of third countries exempted from temporary entry restrictions due to COVID-19, days after the EU Council decided to remove the United States from its own list.
Last July 15, the EU Council included the United States in the list of countries for which travel restrictions were recommended to be lifted. At that time, the Delta variant of the coronavirus had not yet started to become as serious in either the United States or the EU. In early August, the EU kept the US powerhouse on the list, even though the cumulative incidence (CI) already exceeded 270 cases per 100,000 population, because of the economic damage that could be caused by its removal.
Since then, the CI has increased in the United States to 600 cases. This data, as well as the lack of reciprocity on the part of Washington when lifting its restrictions from the EU, finally encouraged the EU Council to modify its list last August 30, to exclude Kosovo (“without prejudice to the positions on its status”), Lebanon, Montenegro, North Macedonia and the United States from the list of third countries whose residents are not affected by the temporary restriction on non-essential travel to the EU through the external borders.
In the case of Spain, the BOE published on July 18 the Order of the Ministry of the Interior modifying the criteria for the application of a temporary restriction on non-essential travel from third countries to the European Union and Schengen associated countries “for reasons of public order and public health due to the health crisis caused by COVID-19”, in order to include, in its annex, the United States in the list of 23 countries and territories exempted from the restriction, in line with the previous decision of the EU Council.
For the same reason, the BOE yesterday published a new amendment to the list following the Council’s decision to remove the United States. With the entry into force of the modification, only 18 States (Albania, Armenia, Australia, Azerbaijan, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brunei, Canada, Japan, Jordan, New Zealand, Qatar, Moldova, Saudi Arabia, Serbia, Singapore, South Korea, Ukraine and China, in addition to the special administrative regions of Hong Kong and Macao) will be exempted from the restrictions on travel to the European Union and, therefore, to Spain. The order will take effect from 00:00 hours on September 6.
