Expats Didn't Carry Fake COVID-19 Certificates: FM

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs has said around 1,600 Bangladeshis who had been to Italy recently did not carry fake Covid-19 negative certificates.

Some of these passengers carried COVID-19 negative certificates on their own just in case they required those subsequently, the ministry said on Thursday.

The Italian government has not yet put any condition to carry the COVID-19 negative certificate for traveling to Italy, according to the ministry.

Unfortunately, the ministry said, some Bangladeshis who traveled to Italy in recent days did not follow the mandatory quarantine rule, and probably a few of them might have spread the virus in the community.

In the last one week, out of 5,000 tests, 65 Bangladeshis, residents of the Lazzio region of Italy, were detected with Covid-19.

The government of Italy has decided to conduct Covid-19 tests for all Bangladeshis (around 30,000) living in the Lazzio region, in coordination with the Embassy of Bangladesh in Rome.

Regarding the ban on flights from Bangladesh to Italy, the said flights from Bangladesh, along with 12 other countries, have been suspended by the Italian authorities till 31 July 2020.

The ministry mentioned that the news published by some newspapers and broadcast by some news channels regarding the detection of Coronavirus among some Bangladeshi expatriates in Italy.