Shymul Azad Chayon

South Africa protested Wednesday that it was being "punished" for finding a new Covid-19 variety called Omicron by the World Health Organization, which is more transmissible than the prevailing Delta strain The decision by a number of countries around the world to ban flights from southern Africa as a result of the variant's discovery "is akin to punishing South Africa for its advanced genomic sequencing and ability to detect new variants faster," according to a statement from the foreign affairs ministry.South Africa's "ability to test and its ramped-up vaccination campaign, backed by a world-class scientific community, should offer our global partners the comfort that we are doing as well as they are in managing the pandemic," according to the government.