New Delhi, Jan 8 (IANS): Delhi Chief Minister Arvind Kejriwal on Friday announced that passengers arriving from the UK will be kept at an isolation facility if they are found Covid-19 positive, in a step to protect city residents from the new strain detected in the country.

"To protect Delhiites from exposure to virus from UK, Del govt takes imp decisions. All those arriving from UK, who test positive will be isolated in an isolation facility," Kejriwal announced in a series of tweets, after chairing a cabinet meeting.

He also said that the UK passengers with negative Covid reports will be taken to a quarantine facility for seven days, followed by seven days home quarantine.

Kejriwal's announcement comes a day after his request to the Central government to extend the ban on UK flights till January 31 against the backdrop of new coronavirus strain which so far has infected a total of 82 persons in India.

The Delhi CM had made the appeal to the Centre after it earlier announced to resume international flights from the UK from January 8. Flights between India and the UK were suspended from December 23 to January 7 in the wake of detection of a more infectious coronavirus strain in UK population.

As per the fresh safety guideline issued on January 4, the Centre had said that those travelling between January 8 and 31 would be mandatorily subjected to self-paid RT-PCR tests on arrival at the Indian airports.