BERLIN — Italy's foreign minister announced Sunday that Italy is suspending flights from Britain "to protect Italians" from the new coronavirus variant.
Minister Luigi Di Maio said on Twitter that the government was preparing a measure that would block flights.
It was not immediately clear when it would it would take effect. Italian media reports indicate about two dozen flights are scheduled to arrive in Italy on Sunday, most in the northern region of Lombardy but also in Veneto and Lazio, which include Venice and Rome respectively.
Earlier the Netherlands, Belgium and Austria on Sunday banned flights from the U.K. and Germany considered limiting such flights to make counter a new strain of coronavirus sweeping across southern England
