Travelers from Saudi Arabia can now make restriction-free entry into Europe

JEDDAH — Travelers from Saudi Arabia can make restriction-free entry into the European Union and Schengen area countries after EU governments agreed to add the Kingdom along with 10 other countries to their safe-travel list by the end of this week.

The decision was taken on Wednesday during a regular meeting of the EU ambassadors, who review the list of safe third countries every two weeks in the wake of the coronavirus outbreak.

The other 10 countries apart from Saudi Arabia that will be added to the list are Armenia, Azerbaijan, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Brunei, Canada, Jordan, Kosovo, Moldova, Montenegro and Qatar.

Currently, Albania, Australia, Israel, Japan, Lebanon, New Zealand, North Macedonia, Rwanda, Serbia, Singapore, South Korea, Taiwan, Thailand, and the United States are on the EU’s safe-travel list.

The former EU member — the United Kingdom — has been left out of the list due to the widely spread Delta variant of the Coronavirus in its territory.

Some European countries have already added Saudi Arabia to their travel "green list," taking into account the low number of coronavirus cases being recorded in the Kingdom recently.