SYDNEY: Australian residents and citizens who have been in India within 14 days of the date they plan to return home will be banned from entering Australia as of Monday and those who disobey will face fines and jail, government officials said.
The temporary emergency determination, issued late on Friday, is the first time Australia has made it a criminal offense for its citizens to return home.
The move is part of strict measures to stop travelers to Australia from the world’s second most populous nation as it contends with a surge in COVID-19 cases and deaths.
The restrictions come into effect from May 3 and breaching the ban risks civil penalties and up to five years imprisonment, Health Minister Greg Hunt said in a statement.
“The government does not make these decisions lightly,” Hunt said.” However, it is critical the integrity of the Australian public health and quarantine systems is protected and the number of COVID-19 cases in quarantine facilities is reduced to a manageable level.”
The government will reconsider the restrictions on May 15.
India’s coronavirus death toll passed 200,000 this week, and cases are nearing 19 million as virulent new strains have combined with “super-spreader” events such as political rallies and religious festivals.
Neela Janakiramanan, an Australian surgeon with family in India said the decision to “criminalize” Australians returning from India was disproportionate and overly punitive.
“Indian-Australians are seeing this as a racist policy because we are being treated different than people from other countries who have had similar waves of infection like the US, the UK and Europe. It is very hard to feel anything other than targeted as an ethnic group.”
A spokesman for the Health Minister “deeply” rejected the view that stopping arrivals from India temporarily was a biased measure, saying it was a difficult but necessary decision that applied “to all people no matter their nationality, race or religion.”
Human rights groups voiced indignation at the ban, suggesting the government’s focus should be on improving its quarantine system, not on punishment.
“This is an outrageous response. Australians have a right of return to their own country,” Human Rights Watch’s Australia director, Elaine Pearson said in a statement.
“The government should be looking for ways to safely quarantine Australians returning from India, instead of focusing their efforts on prison sentences and harsh punishments.”
Australia, which has no community transmissions, on Tuesday introduced a temporary suspension of direct flights from India until mid-May. However, some Australians, including cricketers Adam Zampa and Kane Richardson, returned via Doha.
Tuesday’s move had left over 9,000 Australians stranded in India, 650 of whom are registered as vulnerable, officials said.
Australia has all but stamped out the coronavirus after closing its borders to non-citizens and permanent residents in March 2020, recording just 29,800 cases and 910 deaths.
Australia bans arrivals from India, says offenders face jail, fines
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Australia bans arrivals from India, says offenders face jail, fines
- First time Australia has made it a criminal offense for its citizens to return home
- Australia has all but stamped out the coronavirus after closing its borders to non-citizens and permanent residents in March 2020
UN peacekeepers defy South Sudan military’s order to leave opposition-held town
JUBA, South Sudan: The United Nations Mission in South Sudan said Monday that it would not comply with a government order to shut down its base in Akobo, an opposition stronghold near the Ethiopian border where tens of thousands of refugees have fled.
On Friday, the South Sudanese army ordered UN peacekeepers as well as NGOs and civilians to vacate the town ahead of a planned assault.
But the mission refused to leave and said it would provide “a protective presence for civilians” in the town, adding that the safety and security of its personnel “must be fully respected at all times.”
The UN Mission said it was engaging “intensively with national, state and local stakeholders” regarding this order. “Any military operations in and around Akobo gravely endanger the safety and security of civilians,” said mission chief Anita Kiki Gbeho.
The South Sudanese government has been fighting opposition forces since a 2018 peace deal broke down about a year ago.
A dramatic escalation took place in December 2025, when opposition forces seized several government outposts in northern Jonglei. A government counter-offensive repelled their forces a month later and displaced over 280,000 people. Tens of thousands have sought refuge in Akobo, where a small contingent of UN peacekeepers is stationed.
Fearing the looming government assault on Akobo, humanitarian workers were evacuated over the weekend, and a mass exodus of the population has also begun.
Local officials contacted by the The Associated Press said fleeing civilians faced danger and widespread shortages of essential supplies. Dual Diew, the Akobo County health director, who has fled to Ethiopia, said there were 84 wounded patients at the hospital. “We have most of them with us here now,” he said, adding that they lack medicine and basic nursing equipment.
Christophe Garnier, the leader of Doctors Without Borders in South Sudan said the organization had to evacuate its staff from Akobo on Saturday and learned of the subsequent looting of its hospital and the ransacking of its office.
“People in Akobo must now either flee without protection or remain at risk of being killed, while losing access to health care and other essential services,” he said.
The three Western governments that have played a major role in the peace process — the U.S, UK, and Norway — sent a letter to President Kiir on Monday urging that the army’s evacuation order be revoked and warning of “further deaths, displacement and suffering for the South Sudanese people” if the offensive on Akobo is implemented.
