What we know as US officially issues ‘do not travel’ warning for 21 countries
The travel list has been updated
The US has officially issued a ‘do not travel’ warning for 21 countries.
America is continuing to expand its ‘do not travel list’. The list currently had 21 countries on it as of April 30, with the US State Department constantly reviewing the situation with a risk assessment for each country.
Here’s everything we know about the warnings and how the agency issues them.
The State Department warns against travelling to certain countries for reasons ranging from armed conflict, terrorism, civil unrest, wrongful detention, health, the likelihood of a natural disaster, current events and crime, with a handful recently bumped up to a Level 4 warning.
The news comes as some countries are cutting travel to the US due to tensions with Trump (Win McNamee/Getty Images)
The four travel advisory levels are as follows:
- Level 1: Exercise normal precautions
- Level 2: Exercise increased caution
- Level 3: Reconsider travel
- Level 4: Do not travel
Level 1 remains the lowest advisory and indicates there might be some risk associated with travel while Level 2 could mean certain areas of the country are dangerous.
Both these levels are assessed by the department at least every 12 months.
Level 3 advises Americans to reconsider due to ‘serious risks to safety and security,’ while Level 4, the highest, refers to a ‘greater likelihood of life-threatening risks.’
The State Department reviews these two every six months.
Anyone who willingly travels to a Level 4 country is further advised to write a will and leave DNA samples in case of a worst-case scenario.
Changes to the list
Recent changes to the list include the advisory for Mexico, which has differing levels across each state within the country that range from Level 1 to Level 4, although the travel advice for Mexico as a whole has been at Level 2 for some time already.
Meanwhile, North Korea and Burkina Faso are just some of the countries that have recently been upgraded to the highest level.
The agency warns North Korea is strongly discouraged due to the ‘continuing serious risk of arrest, long-term detention and the threat of wrongful detention.’
Burkina Faso similarly holds a strong warning because of increased ‘terrorism, crime and kidnapping’ threat.
It’s to do with security (Getty Images)
These updates have brought the total number of countries on the list to 21.
Some examples in the Level 1 category are: Canada, Australia, Ireland, Portugal, Argentina and some Caribbean islands, including Aruba and St. Lucia.
At Level 2 sits some popular European countries, including the UK, France, Italy, Spain and Germany.
China, South Africa, Morocco, Peru, The Bahamas and Turks and Caicos Islands are also in Level 2.
On Level 3 include Colombia, Egypt, Guatemala and Jamaica.
And finally, the 21 countries on the ‘do not travel’ list include Russia and Ukraine, due to the conflict between the two countries since President Vladimir Putin‘s invasion, as well as North Korea, Syria, Iraq and Sudan.
The full list is as follows:
- North Korea
- Burkina Faso
- Yemen
- Iran
- South Sudan
- Syria
- Democratic Republic of the Congo
- Afghanistan
- Lebanon
- Central African Republic
- Belarus
- Iraq
- Ukraine
- Venezuela
- Haiti
- Libya
- Somalia
- Russia
- Burma
- Mali
- Sudan
Canada has seen a slump in its flights jetting off to the US in recent months (Getty Images)
Canada cuts travel
The changes also come amid bubbling global tensions and security situations across the world, with Canada recently cutting routes to the US amid the tensions with the Trump administration over the trade war.
That, and the POTUS has made several controversial comments about acquiring Canada as the ’51st state.’
According to US Customs and Border Protection (CBP), travellers from Canada fell by 12.5 percent in February and 18 percent in March.
China has issued a chilling warning for the world amid its trade war standoff with Donald Trump.
The US president and China’s president, Xi Jinping, have been in an aggressive game of tariff tennis since April 2 when Trump inflicted a series of reciprocal tariffs on its trading partners across the world.
Before the big announcement, 20 percent tariffs had already been applied on goods from China, which was then hiked by 34 percent (to a combined total of 54 percent) on so-called ‘Liberation Day.’
Unsurprisingly, China didn’t react so well to the news and as well as filing a lawsuit at the World Trade Organization, they announced retaliatory measures which included 15 percent tariffs on US farm products, 10 percent on crude oil and agricultural machinery, and 34 percent on all US goods.
Days later, Trump snapped back with a 84 percent levy, rising the total of Chinese imports to 104 percent.
Donald Trump and Xi Jinping have been butting heads over tariffs for weeks (Qilai Shen/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
China matched the threat, hiking its retaliatory tariff to 84 percent on US goods.
This to-and-froing has been going on ever since, with Trump raising the tariff on China to 145 percent, and then to 245 percent, while pausing the tariff plans for all other countries for 90 days as China raised tariffs on US goods to 125 percent and reduced exports of rare earth minerals.
Now, it appears the rest of the world could soon be dragged into the conflict between the world powerhouses as China has outlined its next move: threatening other countries that make trade deals with the US.
China says ‘resolute and reciprocal’ countermeasures will be applied to other countries that strike a deal with Trump, with close eyes on Taiwan, Japan and South Korea that have just started negotiating with Washington.
“China firmly opposes any party reaching a deal at the expense of China’s interests,” the Chinese commerce ministry said on Monday (April 21) when discussing Trump’s plan to isolate Beijing.
Trump raised the tariff on China to a staggering 245 percent (Win McNamee/Getty Images)
“Appeasement will not bring peace, and compromise will not be respected … To seek one’s own temporary selfish interests at the expense of others’ interests is to seek the skin of a tiger, which will ultimately fail on both ends and harm others,” they added.
China also stated: “Where the strong prey on the weak, all countries will become victims.”
The threat comes as Trump said the US was in talks with China, hinting that the two world’s largest economies could agree to a ‘very good deal’ yet.
However, that’s up for debate since an article in the state-run newspaper, ChinaDaily.com, slammed the US for its greed and for ‘playing the victim’.
The article stated that the US is ‘not getting ripped off by anybody’ but has the real ‘problem’ of ‘living beyond its means.’
The pair don’t seem to be coming to an agreement over their trade talks anytime soon (Qilai Shen/Bloomberg via Getty Images)
It continued: “It consumes more than it produces. It has outsourced its manufacturing and borrowed money in order to have a higher standard of living than it’s entitled to based on its productivity.
“Rather than being ‘cheated’, the US has been taking a free ride on the globalization train. The US should stop whining about itself being a victim in global trade and put an end to its capricious and destructive behavior.
“Instead, it should commit itself to working with its trading partners to establish a fair, free and WTO-centered multilateral trading system that is in line with the times.”
Donald Trump has seemingly blamed himself for ‘disgraceful’ trade deals made with other countries.
The US President doesn’t seem to be backing down on his plans to inflict reciprocal tariffs on countries around the world, even while in the midst of a 90-day pause on the policy.
On April 2, so-called ‘Liberation Day’, the POTUS announced a series of tariffs levied on foreign goods at various rates, with a baseline of 10 percent.
Speaking from the White House’s Rose Garden, he said: “For decades our country has been looted, pillaged, raped and plundered from nations, near and far, from both friend and foe alike.”
Trump claimed American workers have ‘suffered gravely’ and have been ‘ripped off for 50 years’ while taking aim at former presidents and past leaders who ‘weren’t doing their job’.
Now, however, eagle-eyed viewers have spotted the moment Trump appeared to blame himself for making the very trade deals that have apparently disadvantaged the country.
“I blame the President of the United States that happened to be sitting when these deals were made. Disgraceful.”
Yet, White House archives reveal it was in fact Trump who signed off on some of the deals during his first term as 45th President of the US between 2017 and 2021.
In December 2019, Trump reached a ‘historic’ agreement with China, announcing: “We have agreed to a very large Phase One Deal with China. They have agreed to many structural changes and massive purchases of Agricultural Product, Energy, and Manufactured Goods, plus much more.”
China’s President Xi Jinping has hit back by inflicting tariffs on US goods (POOL/AFP via Getty Images)
The statement added that the US had made ‘important progress towards rebalancing our trade relationship with China’ that would ‘greatly benefit both the American economy and the global economy as a whole’.
Well, if you’ve been following along with the tariffs fallout, you’ll know relations are looking somewhat soured with China with tariffs hiked to 145 percent – and possibly 245 percent – while China snapped back by raising tariffs on US goods to 125 percent and warned global partners that they too could face repercussions if they strike their own deal with Trump.
But that’s not all, as in January 2020 Trump also replaced the then ‘outdated’ North American Free Trade Agreement (NAFTA) with the United States-Mexico-Canada Agreement (USMCA).
Canadian Prime Minister Mark Carney is also pushing back on Trump’s tariffs (Rich Lam/Getty Images)
The Trump administration celebrated the new deal as a ‘tremendous victory’ for workers, farmers, and manufacturers, saying that it brings trade relations with the two countries ‘into the 21st century’.
While both Mexico and Canada were excluded from Trump’s April 2 tariffs announcement, he had previously announced 25 percent tariffs on their goods – with an exemption to products covered by the USMCA – plus tariffs on steel, aluminum and automobiles.
Although Trump distances himself by blaming presidents over the decades, and reasserts the US had ‘the most successful economy in the history of our country [in] my first term’ due to his ‘tough’ trade policies, dozens have taken to Reddit to poke holes in Trump’s argument that others are to blame for the disastrous deals.
“He’s just trying to whitewash history and pin it on Biden,” read one comment.
Another added: “I sincerely would like to hear a Trump’s supporter’s take on this, please. Please explain how Trump is correct here.”
“Dementia Don forgets he is responsible for this mess,” said a third.
A fourth concluded: “He might have forgotten, or he might be lying, but it doesn’t matter because his base will absolutely assume it was Biden and/or Obama.”
Taking to Truth Social, President Donald Trump has insisted his ongoing tariff wars with… well everyone, will ultimately benefit most Americans.
Writing on his social media platform, Donald Trump said that his tariffs will result in a reduction of income tax for households that bring in less than $200,000 a year.
According to the 2023 data from the U.S. Census Bureau, only 14.4% of households earns more than $200,000, meaning that an estimated 85.6% of households will benefit.
Trump said: “When Tariffs cut in, many people’s Income Taxes will be substantially reduced, maybe even completely eliminated. Focus will be on people making less than $200,000 a year.
Donald Trump’s latest comments haven’t inspired confidence(Chip Somodevilla/Getty Images)
“Also, massive numbers of jobs are already being created, with new plants and factories currently being built or planned. It will be a BONANZA FOR AMERICA!!! THE EXTERNAL REVENUE SERVICE IS HAPPENING!!!”
But this post hasn’t inspired total confidence from everyone.
People on Reddit recently reflected on Trump’s claims and admitted they have quite a few reservations about its effectiveness.
One person commented: “A. We are at peak employment. B. We are already manufacturing more than ever in U.S. history. C. This is insane ramblings.”
Another added: “Trump doesn’t understand – we manufacture software, design and movies not engine pistons and make a f**k ton of money from it.
With a third writing: “That’s what’s so baffling about all of this. It can’t do both. It’s impossible. How has no one on his team informed him of this. If it’s bringing jobs back it’s not raising money and if it’s raising money it’s not bringing jobs back.”
And another said: “So which is it? Countries are all making deals with him or hes using tariffs to reduce income taxes? You literally cannot have it both ways.”
Trump has repeatedly defended his economic plan since announcing the tariffs for nations across the world earlier this month.
Trump has repeatedly defended his economic plans against sceptics(SAUL LOEB / AFP)
Economists have also warned the plans could see Americans footing the bill, from their groceries to cars and even their retirement plans. But Trump has insisted his tariffs are the answer and will ultimately work out for the American people.
Earlier this month, he wrote on Truth Social: “We have massive Financial Deficits with China, the European Union, and many others. The only way this problem can be cured is with TARIFFS, which are now bringing Tens of Billions of Dollars into the U.S.A.
“They are already in effect, and a beautiful thing to behold.”
