This March 18, 2020 photo shows people wearing face masks at the Sheremetyevo airport in Moscow, Russia. (DIMITAR DILKOFF / AFP)
The Chinese embassy in Moscow maintains close contacts with its 160,000 citizens in the country, and will provide all necessary help to them, Beijing's ambassador to Russia Zhang Hanhui said on Wednesday.
Speaking to Chinese media, Zhang dismissed reports about Chinese citizens being detained by Russian police and immigration authorities due to visa issues.
He said the embassy was told by the Russian Foreign Ministry on Wednesday that there were no Chinese being detained by Russian law enforcement authorities.
The Chinese embassy in Moscow maintains close contacts with its citizens in the country, and will provide all necessary help to them, Beijing's ambassador to Russia Zhang Hanhui said
"There is lots of fake news on the internet. So the embassy hopes people get information from official channels, rather than listening to rumors," said the ambassador.
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Meanwhile, the port in Suifenhe city in China's Heilongjiang province was temporarily closed on Tuesday as authorities said the increasing numbers of arrivals were beyond the port's ability to handle.
So, the Chinese consulate in the Russian city of Vladivostok, the capital of the Primorsky region which borders Heilongjiang, urged Chinese nationals not to return home through the port city.
"We urged all Chinese in Russia not to try to return from the Far East region," said Zhang, pointing to the risks posed by the logistical challenges, as the pandemic continues around the world.
Risks of long travel time
Explaining the risks, he said that as many Chinese citizens flew over nine hours from Moscow to Vladivostok, and then took a bus to the border from the airport, the long time they spent in a confined space could be dangerous if anyone had symptoms of the virus.
Also, the long travel time was not in keeping with the epidemic prevention guidelines of the Russian government, Zhang added.
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The envoy said that from March 28 to April 30, everyone in Russia, including Russians and foreign citizens, were to stay at home except for special circumstances, such as going to grocery stores and pharmacies for necessities, walking dogs, and going to work.
Separately, the chief of the Russian Medical Biological Agency, Veronika Skvortsova, said that as the daily growth in confirmed coronavirus cases in Russia was only about 20 percent, it was possible to avert a spike in morbidity with a strict quarantine and isolation policy.
As of Wednesday, the number of infections in Russia had risen by 1,175 in the previous 24 hours, reaching 8,672, with 580 recoveries and 63 deaths.
In a related development, Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered the government to hand over all non-woven material to companies making medical masks and protection suits.
