124 Indonesians Students Return to China on Chartered Plane

TEMPO.CO, Jakarta - Fifty-four universities in 21 cities in China will welcome the return of Indonesian students who had left at the beginning of the Covid-19 pandemic early 2020. On September 7, 124 Indonesian students landed in Guangzhou on a chartered Citilink aircraft flying from Jakarta. They then underwent a centralized quarantine in the province.

There had been concerns about the fate of some Indonesian students. Upon arrival in China to resume their pandemic-halted studies, their campuses in Shanghai were unable to provide certainties about their statuses. These are students who were part of the first group that returned to China during the pandemic.

"Yes, we have received the confirmation. So, there are no longer any problems on campus," Yaya Sutarya, the Education and Culture Attaché at the Indonesian Embassy in Beijing, said on Monday, September 19.

China's health authorities require everyone arriving from overseas to undergo ten days of centralized quarantine in the landing city they land in, during which they must take PCR tests periodically. After completing the centralized quarantine, they are required to undergo monitored quarantine in their respective destination cities.

Before the pandemic, there were some 14,000 Indonesian students in China. When the pandemic began to spread in Wuhan, Hubei Province in January 2020, most foreign nationals China, including Indonesian students.

Not long after, China closed its borders to students who were abroad. Starting this year, China is allowing foreign students to enter gradually even though the Covid-19 transmission rate is still high.

ANTARA

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