The Portuguese Ministry of Foreign Affairs announced today the enlargement of non-essential flights between Portugal and Mozambique, including other Portuguese-speaking African Countries (PALOP) such as Angola, Cape Verde, Guinea-Bissau and São Tomé and Príncipe.

Among the PALOP countries, only Equatorial Guinea is excluded from this authorization.

This measure is a change to the air traffic rules that had been imposed to prevent the spread of covid-19.

The five Portuguese-speaking countries thus join the European Union (EU) member states and countries associated with the Schengen area, as well as Brazil, Canada, the United States, and the United Kingdom, which were already covered by the same order.

The provisions on essential travel, i.e. those for professional, study, family, health, humanitarian or other reasons, remain unchanged.

The established rules regarding the submission of Covid-19 vaccination or recovery certificates and SARS-CoV-2 virus tests also remain in place.

Covid-19 has caused at least 6,011,769 deaths worldwide since the pandemic began, according to the latest report by Agence France-Presse.