British Nationals Abroad: Coronavirus

(asked on 28th April 2020) - View Source

Question to the Foreign, Commonwealth & Development Office:

To ask Her Majesty's Government to list, by airline, how many repatriation flights they have provided since 1 February for British citizens stranded due to COVID-19; and how many such citizens remain abroad waiting for flights. [T]


Answered by
 Portrait
Lord Ahmad of Wimbledon
Minister of State (Foreign, Commonwealth and Development Office)
This question was answered on 5th May 2020

The welfare of British nationals remains our top priority, and we remain committed to ensuring that British travellers around the globe are able to return home. Since the outbreak in Wuhan, we estimate that over 1.3 million people have returned to the UK via commercial routes - the majority supported by our work with airlines and foreign governments to keep vital routes open. We have now brought back more than 22,500 people on 108 flights organised by the Foreign Office from 22 different countries and territories. We have worked with the following airlines to provide these flights: British Airways, Biman, Cathay Pacific, EgyptAir, LATAM, PAL, Qatar Airways, Titan, TUI, Virgin Atlantic, Viva, Vueling.

We are aware that there are tens of thousands of British nationals remaining overseas and our effort is focused on supporting their return as quickly and safely as possible. Over the next week we will return thousands more Brits on 10s of charter flights from India, Nigeria, Argentina, Bangladesh, Colombia, Guyana, Honduras, Ghana, Pakistan, Nigeria, and New Zealand.

Reticulating Splines