Germany’s Foreign Minister Heiko Maas said on Monday that the Federal Republic’s government has repatriated about 120,000 of an estimated 200,000 German tourists stuck abroad due to COVID-19 restrictions in recent days.
Attention is now increasingly turning to travelers in more remote countries, like Chile, Mexico, New Zealand and Gambia, from where repatriation presented a greater logistical challenge, he said.
Berlin was working with travel companies to bring their customers home but was also chartering its own flights where necessary, the minister said. Arranging flights has become more difficult as countries close their airspaces and airports, Maas added.