Covid-19 lockdown: NZer stuck on Maldives atoll

From Checkpoint, 5:36 pm on 6 April 2020

The New Zealand government has made arrangements to charter a flight for New Zealanders stranded in Peru. Around 87 New Zealanders are there and Foreign Minister Winston Peters says the flight will leave Lima although an exact date has not been set.

It comes as a Wellington woman sees the pandemic out on a tiny atoll in the Maldives after Singapore closed its borders shutting off any opportunity for her to get home.

Ariana Bell works for a dive centre and is semi-quarantined on the island of Baa, which is a 30 minute flight from the capital Malé.

The government has banned all international travel without a confirmed ticket. There are 19 cases of Covid-19 on the Maldives but none on Ariana's atoll.

She spoke Checkpoint via Skype from what would normally be an island paradise.