African people continue to be barred from hotels, shops and restaurants in Guangzhou, despite Chinese officials assuring governments across Africa that discrimination resulting from efforts to contain the coronavirus outbreak would stop. Racist discrimination in Guangzhou earlier this month caused outrage in Africa, provoking rare official protests to China by several countries. Anger in Africa rose earlier this month when images of African residents in Guangzhou being barred from various locations began circulating on social media. Other images showed evicted Africans sleeping on the streets. China has maintained strict screening protocols, concerned about any resurgence in infections by virus carriers who exhibit no symptoms or by infected people arriving from abroad. Authorities have limited international flights and blocked almost all foreigners from entering the country, as well as required mandatory centralised quarantines for those returning from overseas. Experts say such wariness has given rise to new levels of xenophobia and that Africans have borne the brunt of this. The area in Guagnzhou where Africans live has been known for years as Chocolate City and the people who have lived there have routinely faced attacks from locals.
SOURCE: THE GUARDIAN