Spain lifts restrictions for UK travellers
Spain is revving up for a return of summer tourists with prime minister Pedro Sanchez on Friday offering an upbeat outlook after his government lifted travel restrictions on British visitors.
The European Union also moved a step closer to allowing cross-border travel.
Sanchez said those two developments will bring "a very much better summer" thanlastyear,whenthetourist industry in one of the world's most popular vacation destinations was crushed by limits on travel and gatherings due to the Covid-19 pandemic.
"We are hugely thrilled at the prospect of our tourism industry recovering, of the streets of our towns and cities filling up once more," he told an annual tourism congress in Madrid.
Spain, Sanchez said, will be "delighted,extremelydelighted" to receive British tourists again.
Spainisliftingitsrestrictions on travellers from the United Kingdom beginning on Mon
day. In 2019, Britain sent 18 million people to Spain, the most of any country.
However, Sanchez did not mention that Spain is on the UK Government's amber list, meaning people traveling backtotheukfromspainstill need to go into quarantine for 10 days and get multiple Covid-19 tests.
It means that Britons who cannot work from home are unlikely to go to Spain until the rules change.
Sanchezsaiditwas"extraordinary news" that the EU is poised to introduce a system of Covid-19 travel certificates foreucitizensbyjuly1,allowing them to travel freely.