Indian crew, passengers on board cruise ship quarantined off Japan due to coronavirus

Several Indian crew members and passengers onboard a cruise ship have been quarantined off Japan in the wake of coronavirus outbreak, External Affairs Minister S Jaishankar said on Friday.

He said none of them have tested positive and India is closely following the developments.

"Many Indian crews and some Indian passengers are onboard the cruise ship Diamond Princess quarantined off Japan due to Coronavirus. None have tested positive, as per the latest information provided by our Embassy (in Tokyo). We are closely following the developments," Jaishankar said in a tweet.

India has so far reported three confirmed cases of novel coronavirus (nCoV) from Kerala. Three medical students studying at the Wuhan University, who returned to India recently, tested positive for the virus.

The death toll in China's novel coronavirus outbreak has gone up to 637 with 73 new mortalities reported, mostly from the worst-affected Hubei province. The total number of confirmed cases has crossed 31,000 in China.