Is China Boycotting Travel to France?
Travel Blog • Michael Yessis • 06.18.08 | 12:27 PM ET
The AP reports a plunge in Chinese travelers to France, apparently in retaliation for, among other things, support for Tibet among the French and demonstrations against the Olympic torch relay in Paris. The French Foreign Ministry said Chinese officials have told travel agents to stop selling trips to France. China’s Tourism Bureau apparently wouldn’t comment, but several travel agents reportedly told AP they “had heard about—if not received—the verbal order” to not sell trips to France.
Related on World Hum:
* Travel to China Down in 2008
* China Blocks Travel to Ethnic Tibetan Regions
Email to friend
Twitter
del.icio.us
Digg
Facebook
Furl
Ma.gnolia
Mixx
Reddit
StumbleUpon
Yahoo! Buzz
Michael Yessis is the cofounder and coeditor-in-chief of World Hum.
tyler 06.19.08 | 12:23 AM ET
I just read on Lonely Planet’s forum a Frenchman was denied a Chinese visa, which he has held/been renewing for 14 years because “you are French.”
COL Jim 06.19.08 | 9:49 AM ET
China needs to take lessons from the Vietnamese or Thais when it comes to encouraging tourism and quit applying repressive tactics whenever they discover they cannot control freedom of speech and moral indignation in “free” countries. Let’s see, the French are denied the Great Wall, Bejing and a bunch of temples just like ones in Taiwan, South Korea, or half of Asiaa, and the Chinese are denied access to one of Western Civilizations greatest countries. Too bad for the Chinese!
Sue 06.23.08 | 9:42 PM ET
As a China citizen who travels abroad several times and enjoys the travelling a lot, I myself would avoid going France for a while because of safety concern, not official “order”, if any. More specifically, with so many French policeman there, they were not able to protect a diasabled girl from being attacked by the protestors during the relay. And in the mean time, severeral bad news about Asian travellers robbed or attacked came up. I usually travel alone. how can I trust those cops if I got any trouble in there? It’s not absolutely necessary to go France to see a western civilization.