Ireland will adopt the European Union’s Covid-19 certificate to help citizens move more freely across the bloc and allow the resumption of international travel from mid-July. The country’s government said it will broadly apply the same approach to arrivals from elsewhere including Britain and the US. The taoiseach, Micheál Martin, also confirmed a gradual easing from one of the EU’s most stringent lockdowns will continue, with bars and restaurants able to serve guests indoors from 5 July. Arts and sports events can also resume indoors and outside but with heavy restrictions on attendance. Ireland currently advises citizens against non-essential travel, imposes fines on people heading to airports to go on holiday and enforces a two-week mandatory hotel quarantine for arrivals from 50 countries. From 19 July, the EU digital Covid certificate will allow people who have received a vaccine, had a negative test or are immune after recovering from the virus to travel freely around the bloc. However, Ireland will not restore the common travel area with Britain because of concerns over the Covid-19 variant first identified in India, despite pleas from ferry companies. The more transmissible variant accounts for 6-7% of cases in Ireland but up to three-quarters of cases in the UK. People can still enter the UK from Ireland without restrictions. Under Ireland’s plan, unvaccinated children aged between seven and 18 must have a negative coronavirus test before coming to the country, regardless of departure point. Passengers with valid proof of vaccination from outside the bloc can also travel freely, so long as the countries they are arriving from are not deemed to be at high risk of spreading Covid-19 variants. Unvaccinated travellers from outside the EU must arrive with a negative test and self-quarantine until they take a second post-arrival test. The approach to travel outside the European Economic Area will apply to neighbouring mainland Britain, despite the India variant, and the United States. Ireland does allow free movement across its open border with Northern Ireland, which the deputy prime minister, Leo Varadkar, acknowledged meant that someone could travel freely to Ireland from mainland Britain via Belfast.