Most flights into and out of China remain grounded
While the rest of world is flying again
The scene on one side of Beijing’s Capital International Airport is normal. Countless passengers sit under its vast curved roof waiting for their domestic flights. Shops cater to anyone in need of high-end sunglasses or perfume. But on the international side, things are eerily quiet. Staff in full-body suits deal with the passengers on flights into and out of China. They have little to do.
Before the covid-19 pandemic, the airport ranked as the world’s second-busiest. Today, not so much. Domestic air travel is humming. But the number of international air passengers across all of China’s airports has fallen from 74m in 2019 to 1.5m last year. In Beijing, until recently, there were hardly any international arrivals at all under what one foreign-airline executive called the “forbidden-city policy”.
This article appeared in the China section of the print edition under the headline "No-fly zone"
From the August 27th 2022 edition
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