BERLIN (AP) – Germany on Sunday implemented strict border controls on its borders with the Czech Republic and the Austrian province of Tyrol in an effort to stem the spread of more contagious variants of the coronavirus.
The new restrictions that took effect at midnight limit the entry of these areas to German citizens and residents, truck drivers, transport workers and healthcare workers and a few others, who must register online and submit a negative coronavirus test.
The German government warned that some delays at the border are possible, but the police said there were no major congestions on Sunday morning.
Infection rates in Germany have been steadily declining in recent weeks, but officials are concerned about the possible impact of variants first discovered in Britain and South Africa. Both variants have been reported in Germany, but so far appear to be be responsible for only a small proportion of cases.
A significant number of cases of the latter have been discovered in Tyrol, whose residents have had to show a recent negative coronavirus test to travel to the rest of Austria since Friday. The spread of the British variant led to a total blockade of some Czech districts on the border with Germany and Poland.
Bavarian Governor Markus Soeder, speaking in Schirnding, on the Czech border, said that “not taking mutations (of the virus) seriously would have significant consequences.”
Soeder, whose state contains half the German-Czech border and the entire German-Austrian border, noted that Czech border districts have particularly high infection rates.
“In addition, there is concern at the moment with our Czech partners that it is not clear what will happen to the management of the crown,” said Soeder, pointing to the Czech parliament’s refusal to extend the state of emergency. “We are friends, we help; we will be happy to receive Czech patients if we want, but it is clear that if there were no measures at the border, that would mean a significant danger ”.
It was not immediately clear which cross-border passengers would be allowed to enter Germany. Federal Interior Minister Horst Seehofer said that those working in “systemically relevant sectors” will be allowed to cross over and the authorities will be “pragmatic whenever possible”.
Seehofer bluntly rejected criticism of the European Union’s border controls, and Soeder echoed that. “Brussels can make an important contribution” to speed up the vaccination campaign, he said, but the German police will do their job at the border.
On Sunday morning, the federal police said that 288 of the 717 people checked on the Bavarian-Czech border were stopped because they had no right to cross, along with 247 of the more than 1,000 checked on the border with Tyrol.
Chancellor Angela Merkel and Germany’s 16 state governors agreed on Wednesday to extend most restrictions on the blockade until March 7, although schools and hairdressers may open earlier.
They set a new target of 35 new cases per 100,000 inhabitants per week, before allowing small shops, museums and other businesses to reopen. That number stood at 57.4 on Sunday, down from almost 200 before Christmas.
The governor of the state of Saxony, in eastern Saxony, warned the Germans against waiting too early.
“Unfortunately, there can be no Easter holidays in Germany this year,” Michael Kretschmer told the Bild am Sonntag newspaper. “Too much mobility as a result of travel and tourism as early as April would be a poison. We would destroy everything we have achieved since mid-December. “
Hotels and restaurants in Saxony, which contains the rest of Germany’s border with the Czech Republic and was hit hard in the fall and winter, will have to remain closed during Easter, and the reopening of theaters and operas will have to wait until after Easter. he said.
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