China's Shenzhen eases COVID lockdown; Chengdu extends curbs

China's Shenzhen city eased a COVID-19 lockdown on Monday as infections in its latest outbreak showed signs of stabilising, while most of the 21.2 million residents of Chengdu city faced extended curbs on their movements. An outbreak since late August prompted the technology hub of Shenzhen to order most of its 17.7m residents to remain largely at home over the weekend and to take two rounds of tests. By Monday, certain restrictions on dining and visits to some parks were eased and many subway stations resumed operations, in an effort to minimise disruption while adhering to the government's "dynamic COVID-zero" policy that aims at containing each and every outbreak. But Shenzhen remains on high alert for subvariants of the Omicron variant of the novel coronavirus, which emerged in the central Chinese city of Wuhan in late 2019. Entertainment venues are shut and large events suspended in most parts of the city, and most people are banned from visiting residential compounds unless they're on a list of people allowed in. Chengdu extended its lockdown for most people to Wednesday to enable authorities to complete another round of mass testing that began on Monday. As of Monday morning, 88% of flights at Chengdu's Shuangliu Airport had been cancelled while the city's Tianfu Airport saw 95% of its flights cancelled, up from 62% and 79% respectively, on Thursday, the first day of the lockdown. Flights in many other cities remain suspended. The flight cancellation rate at Lhasa's Gongga Airport in Tibet was at 97% and Sanya's Phoenix Airport in Hainan province in the south was at 90%, while Xining's Caojiapu Airport in northwestern Qinghai province stood at 96% and Shenzhen's Baoan Airport was at 82%.<br/>