On 15 June, Ukraine loosened coronavirus restrictions to relaunch international air travel, which had been suspended since 13 March, and reopened its borders for foreign citizens coming from countries with a stable epidemiological situation, or foreign citizens leaving the country. However, at present only certain categories of Ukrainian citizens can leave – those traveling for work, study, or medical purposes, or have relatives living abroad.
Airplanes are disinfected after each trip. Photo: Ukrinform On 15 June, airplanes departed from Boryspil to the Ukrainian cities of Dnipro and Odesa, to Minsk (Belarus), Akhmedabad (India), Dubai (OAE), Amsterdam (The Netherlands), and Vilnius (Lithuania).
The other smaller Sikorski airport in Kyiv plans to reopen on 16 June, with planned flights heading to Poland, Germany, Portugal, Belarus, the Baltic states.
However, most tourist destinations will remain off-limits for Ukrainians until 1 July, when most countries with named destinations plan to open their borders. Albania and the USA are ready to accept Ukrainian citizens without limitations, the UK has a mandatory two-week observation period. Türkiye, Egypt, Tunisia, Georgia informed they were ready to open their borders starting from July.
- Check out the latest COVID-19 statistics on our page Interactive COVID-19: Ukraine and world
Who can enter Ukraine?
To enter Ukraine, foreigners are required to have an insurance policy covering the treatment of the novel coronavirus and paying the expenses of an observation period, according to a decree on the Cabinet of Ministers’ website.
Persons coming into Ukraine from countries with a “significant spread of COVID-19” are required to undergo observation, i.e. a two-week self-isolation period in special establishments. Such persons will likely be transported from checkpoints to these places of observation.
But some are exempt from undergoing an observation period, namely – citizens of countries with a high spread of COVID-19 who had not been in their countries for the last 14 days, employees of diplomatic missions and consular posts of foreign states, missions of official international missions, organizations accredited in Ukraine and their families, drivers and crew members of freight vehicles, crew members of aircraft and ships, river vessels, members of train and locomotive crews, participants of external independent evaluation together with one person accompanying each of them, if there is no reason to believe that they were in contact with a person with COVID-19.
Also, persons who have consented to self-isolation with the help of the “Act at Home” phone app are not subject to observation – but are required to stay at home, which is monitored through the app.
So, what are the states with a “significant spread of COVID-19”? The Cabinet defined this as countries where the number of active cases of COVID-19 exceed 40 people per 100,000 of population. The Ministry of Health should provide a list of these states every three days to the Border Service, and there is a list for 14 April.
But you can also make an estimate of the situation in your country with the help of our interactive map based on data by the John Hopkins University.
Or, see the column “Active cases per 100,000” in the table below:
