China has barred foreigners from traveling to Tibet until after sensitive Oct. 1 celebrations marking the 60th birthday of communist China, a government tourism office and travel agents said yesterday.
A woman official at the official Lhasa Tourism Bureau in the regional capital said the ban would officially go into effect yesterday.
“Passes for foreign travelers to enter Tibet will be suspended from Sept. 24 to Oct. 8. That’s according to a notice from the Tibet Tourism Bureau,” said the woman, who refused to give her name.
She said the notice contained no further information and no reason for the measure.
Officials with the regional government and Tibet Tourism Bureau refused to comment.
However, travel agents said the ban was already in place.
“It started from Monday, according to the notice from the Tibet Tourism Bureau. Passes for foreign travelers are suspended until Oct. 8,” said a woman staff member at the Tibet Youth Travel Service.
Staff at two other major travel agencies also confirmed the ban.
The move is the latest sign of intense official concern over security ahead of National Day, which will mark 60 years since Mao Zedong (毛澤東) proclaimed the founding of the People’s Republic of China at Tiananmen Square in Beijing.
The government already has sharply ramped up security in the capital, putting thousands of extra police on the streets ahead of the festivities, which will include a military parade, fireworks and mass performances at the square.
State media reported on Monday that outgoing flights would be halted at Beijing’s airport during the parade, and retailers have said they have been banned from selling kitchen knives after two recent stabbings near the square.
Foreign tourists must obtain special permission from the Chinese government to enter Tibet, the remote Himalayan region where resentment against Chinese control has seethed for decades.
China has banned foreign tourists from visiting Tibet before, including after deadly anti-Chinese riots that erupted in Lhasa and across the Tibetan plateau in March last year, triggering a massive Chinese security clampdown.
Beijing also barred foreigners in March of this year during the tense 50th anniversary of a failed 1959 uprising against China that sent the Dalai Lama, the Tibetan spiritual leader, into exile.
The bans and tight security in Tibet since last year’s unrest have devastated the picturesque Buddhist region’s tourism industry, state media said.
Reports have said visitor arrivals dropped to 2.2 million last year, compared with four million the year before.
Chinese authorities are currently grappling with seething ethnic unrest in the restive western region of Xinjiang, including a wave of mysterious syringe attacks.
Beijing has blamed Uighurs for the attacks.
Staff at several major state-run travel agents handling Xinjiang tours said yesterday they had so far received no notice of any ban on foreign tourists to the region.
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