The First Minister has warned we must avoid lifting international travel restrictions too soon. 

Nicola Sturgeon said international travel poses a "big risk" of importing new variants of the virus. 

Speaking on the Sophy Ridge on Sunday show, she admitted easing travel guidance "too quickly" last summer. 

She said: "The big risk that we face, not just in Scotland but in the UK, is the importation of new variants of the virus.

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"Variants that might be faster spreading, that might be more severe, and crucially variants that might undermine the efficacy of the vaccines.

"We have to be very careful about that which is why I think one of the restrictions we're all going to have to live with for longer is a restriction on international travel.

"We must not allow the progress we are making domestically to be undermined by a too lax position on international travel."

"We probably opened up international travel too quickly so we allowed the virus to re-seed into our domestic population.

"I think it is important we try the best we can to avoid that in the weeks and months ahead."

However, she added that the fast-spreading Indian variant was not currently a concern but was being monitored. 

She said: "It is a variant of interest as opposed to a variant of concern."