The launch of the first luxury train service from Beijing to Tibet has been postponed from next month until next spring, the operator said yesterday, amid China’s economic slowdown and a security crackdown.
A reservations staffer for Tangula Luxury Trains confirmed a Hong Kong newspaper report of the postponement, but did not provide further comment. He would not give his name because he was not authorized to speak to the media.
Other staff authorized to comment were not immediately available.
China’s growth has slowed precipitously in recent months as exports have plunged and the impact is reverberating through the world’s third-largest economy.
The burgeoning market for luxury goods and services is suffering, with occupancy rates at top-flight hotels plunging and brand-name boutiques void of customers, as consumers cut back on nonessential spending.
This latest delay, until the spring of next year, resulted in the loss of about US$2 million in advance bookings, the South China Morning Post reported yesterday, citing a company spokeswoman. So far US$100 million has been invested in the project, it said.
Although the Post said Tangula’s spokeswoman characterized the postponement as a “business decision” that had nothing to do with travel restrictions, travel to Tibet has virtually collapsed amid a security crackdown aimed at preventing unrest linked to several critical anniversaries this year of anti-Chinese uprisings and riots.
China banned travel to Tibet last March amid a revival of unrest and, although restrictions were gradually eased, the number of visitors dropped by nearly half in the first nine months of last year, Xinhua news agency reported.
Tourism revenues plunged 54 percent to 1.8 billion yuan (US$264 million), it said.
“It’s not a good time to visit Tibet now and I think you know the reason,” said Xiao Su, sales manager for the Tibet-China Travel Agency, based in the Tibetan capital, Lhasa.
“On the one hand, the most beautiful season is yet to come in a few months and also some stores are closed now since there are so few tourists,” Xiao said.
Tangula plans to run luxury trains from Beijing to Tibet and southwest China’s Yunnan Province. The fares are US$3,300 to US$5,000 per person, depending on the route.
Tangula, the first foreign-invested passenger train service in China, earlier postponed the launch of the train service from September last year until next month.
Hong Kong-based Wing On Travel owns a majority stake in Tangula Railtours, a joint venture between Tangula Group Ltd and the state-owned Qinghai-Tibet Railway Corp.
North Korean leader Kim Jong-un sent Chinese President Xi Jinping (習近平) greetings with what appeared to be restrained rhetoric that comes as Pyongyang moves closer to Russia and depends less on its long-time Asian ally. Kim wished “the Chinese people greater success in building a modern socialist country,” in a reply message to Xi for his congratulations on North Korea’s birthday, the state-run Korean Central News Agency reported yesterday. The 190-word dispatch had little of the florid language that had been a staple of their correspondence, which has declined significantly this year, an analysis by Seoul-based specialist service NK Pro showed. It said
On an island of windswept tundra in the Bering Sea, hundreds of miles from mainland Alaska, a resident sitting outside their home saw — well, did they see it? They were pretty sure they saw it — a rat. The purported sighting would not have gotten attention in many places around the world, but it caused a stir on Saint Paul Island, which is part of the Pribilof Islands, a birding haven sometimes called the “Galapagos of the north” for its diversity of life. That is because rats that stow away on vessels can quickly populate and overrun remote islands, devastating bird
‘CLOSER TO THE END’: The Ukrainian leader said in an interview that only from a ‘strong position’ can Ukraine push Russian President Vladimir Putin ‘to stop the war’ Decisive actions by the US now could hasten the end of the Russian war against Ukraine next year, Ukrainian President Volodymyr Zelenskiy said on Monday after telling ABC News that his nation was “closer to the end of the war.” “Now, at the end of the year, we have a real opportunity to strengthen cooperation between Ukraine and the United States,” Zelenskiy said in a post on Telegram after meeting with a bipartisan delegation from the US Congress. “Decisive action now could hasten the just end of Russian aggression against Ukraine next year,” he wrote. Zelenskiy is in the US for the UN
A 64-year-old US woman took her own life inside a controversial suicide capsule at a Swiss woodland retreat, with Swiss police on Tuesday saying several people had been arrested. The space-age looking Sarco capsule, which fills with nitrogen and causes death by hypoxia, was used on Monday outside a village near the German border. The portable human-sized pod, self-operated by a button inside, has raised a host of legal and ethical questions in Switzerland. Active euthanasia is banned in the country, but assisted dying has been legal for decades. On the same day it was used, Swiss Department of Home