10 Years in Prison for UAE travellers trying to Illegally enter UK from Third Country.

Breaking: 10 Years in Prison for UAE travellers trying to Illegally enter UK from Third Country. Expats face compulsory quarantine and fines.

Matt Hancock, the UK’s Health Secretary has announced (9 February 2021) that people entering the UK who try and bypass government coronavirus rules by illegally trying to enter the UK from a third country will face up to 10 years in prison. Currently the UAE is on the government’s Red List of countries banning non UK and Irish nationals from entering the UK. Details on the countries currently on the red list can be found here. The Internet has been rife with discussions on how travellers can avoid the travel ban by flying to third countries to mask their originating countries, these including the UAE, from UK authorities.

Hancock said the government will also impose £5,000 fines for UK and Irish nationals who have been in red list countries and who refuse to quarantine in one of the  government-designated hotels on arrival in the UK.

Foreign nationals who have been in or through any red list countries over the previous 10 days are banned from entering the UK completely.

UK and Irish nationals are permitted entry – but only if they immediately quarantine, at their own cost, in designated hotels for 10 days. UK and Irish Nationals will also have to undergo a test two and eight days into their quarantine on threat of £1000 to £2000 fines for failure to comply. Those who refuse to be tested will find themselves unable to (ever) leave the designated hotels.

Hancock was strident:

“I make no apologies for the strength of these measures because we’re dealing with one of the strongest threats to our public health that we’ve faced as a nation.”

The decision impacts on all parents whose children are currently in schools in the UK, or who have an urgent need to visit the country.

The UKs decision to add the UAE to its red list following growing concern about the South African variant of Covid 19 which is better able to counter, and in some cases almost bypass,  vaccines.

Complete information and guidelines for those impacted by the decision in the UAE can be found here.

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