Abe seeks to cancel, postpone large-scale events

February 26, 2020

Tokyo--Japanese Prime Minister Shinzo Abe Wednesday requested that large-scale sports and cultural events be canceled, postponed or scaled back in the next two weeks to contain the spread of the coronavirus.

"The next one to two weeks will be very crucial to preventing its spread," Abe said at a meeting of his task force on the virus.

Abe also said the country will ban entry to non-Japanese who have been in the South Korean city of Daegu and the neighboring county of Cheongdo in the last two weeks.

Tokyo already bans entry of non-Japanese who have stayed in China's Hubei and Zhejiang provinces in the last two weeks as well as those who hold passports issued by the two provinces. The planned ban is the first of its kind for a country outside of China.

The move comes as South Korea sees a surge in coronavirus cases among people who attended a service at a religious group called the Shincheonji Church of Jesus in Daegu.

On Tuesday, the Japanese Foreign ministry raised its virus alert for Daegu and Cheongdo to Level 2, urging Japanese citizens to avoid nonessential travel there.

The Japanese government has no plans to send chartered flights to South Korea to evacuate Japanese citizens there, Chief Cabinet Secretary Yoshihide Suga said at a press conference.

"The government doesn't believe that Japanese citizens in places such as Daegu are in a situation currently where they aren't able to leave with their own will," Suga said. Jiji Press