Intercontinental business groups in Hong Kong are pleading with the government to restart flights as a score company warned that a ban on international travel would prevent firms from utilizing Hong Kong as their regional headquarters.

Executives who travelled residence for Christmas have been stranded exterior of the Asian economical hub soon after authorities suspended flights from 8 international locations, which includes the US and the Uk, to guard the metropolis from the Omicron variant.

David Graham, govt director of the British Chambers of Commerce in Hong Kong, mentioned the “unfortunate” flight ban experienced taken numerous by surprise.

“It will inevitably result in significant disturbance and inconvenience, particularly for the lots of Hong Kong-dependent executives and staff members who travelled to the United kingdom for the Christmas interval to be with relatives and who were being looking to return to Hong Kong early in January,” he informed the Fiscal Instances.

“We very a lot hope that the ban will be for a really constrained period given the substantial quarantine and screening actions previously in area for those returning from the British isles.”

Hong Kong, which is pursuing a “zero-Covid” coverage, has reimposed quite a few social distancing rules after an outbreak that was seeded by Cathay Pacific flight crew, who experienced been exempt from traveller quarantine orders.

Flights from the 8 nations were banned for a 14-working day period on Wednesday previous week. Other airlines, these kinds of as Air Canada and Virgin Atlantic, have briefly halted flights since they have been unable to accommodate the Hong Kong government’s quarantine needs for crew.

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The govt reported much more stringent measures had to be executed mainly because the metropolis was experiencing the danger of a “major outbreak”.

Fitch Rankings said, even so, that the new constraints could damp Hong Kong’s financial development prospective clients. “We think the tightening of restrictions on intercontinental arrivals will generate even more obstructions to the territory’s potential to…