Number of Chinese tourists to surge 60% this year

Number of Chinese tourists to surge 60% this year


The Tourism Ministry forecasts that the number of Chinese visitors will surge 60% this year to 40,000 as Israel tries to take a bigger bite into the more than $100 billion that Chinese tourists spend annually.

More than three years ago, then-Tourism Minister Stas Misezhnikov prioritized  tourism from China. Since then, tourist arrivals from the Middle Kingdom have increased between 20% and 30% annually, but the numbers are minuscule compared to the 100 million Chinese who took overseas trips last year.

Israel is particularly targeting middle- and upper-class tourists as well as Chinese Christians. In 2012, the Chinese tourist’s average spending per day in Israel was $286 not including souvenirs — higher than for visitors from any other country. Overall, Chinese tourists spent $102 billion on overseas travel.

As part of the government’s efforts, Tourism Minister Uzi Landau will head a delegation to China in June that will include executives from the Israeli airline and hotel industries. The 20 or so Israelis will study the needs of Chinese tourists, seek to develop ties with travel wholesalers in China, and address barriers to growth in Chinese tourism to the Holy Land.

A big barrier is the red tape in issuing tourist visas to Chinese citizens, something the Tourism Ministry aims to simplify.

“Our challenge is to dramatically reduce the amount of time — currently as much as a month — that it takes a Chinese tourist to obtain an Israeli visa,” Landau said. “To accomplish this, we are in touch with the immigration authorities, the Interior Ministry and the embassy in China.”

Another major impediment is El Al Israel Airlines’ monopoly on nonstop flights to and from China.

“We’ve had several discussions with the head of the Chinese aviation authority about more direct flights to Israel, and we’ll be appointing a special adviser precisely for that purpose — adding another airline to fly directly from China. More direct routes could change the entire picture,” Landau said, adding that efforts were being made to add a weekly charter flight from Shanghai.

Arunachal athletes, students caught in web of India-China visa politics

The two young archers, Maselo Mihu and Sorang Yumi, who had, last week, hoped to travel to the youth world championships in Wuxi, in the southern Chinese province of Jiangsu, are, however, unlikely to be the last Arunachal residents affected by the visa row.Indeed, neither were they the first. Only last year, a student from Arunachal was not allowed to join a 100-member youth delegation to China after she was issued a stapled visa. The delegation, nevertheless, travelled to Beijing and other cities, and also had an audience with top Chinese leaders.And, in 2011, a Karate team from the State was prevented from boarding a flight in New Delhi because its members had been issued stapled visas by the Chinese Embassy.

The incidents prompted the former Bharatiya Janata Party Member of Parliament, Kiren Rijiju, to send a letter to Prime Minister Manmohan Singh earlier this year, in which he urged the Indian government to allow people from Arunachal to travel to China on stapled visas.Doing so, he wrote, would not result in "compromising its position on sovereignty over the border region" and would "downgrade the status of Arunachal Pradesh to a less confrontational one."But that is not a view shared by many Indian officials, who point out that allowing citizens to travel would be tantamount to recognising China's territorial claims and undermining India's negotiating position on the boundary dispute.

China claims around 90,000 square kilometres in Arunachal Pradesh, in the eastern sector of the boundary, while India says China is in occupation of at least 38,000 square kilometres in Aksai Chin, in the west.In all three cases of stapled visas being issued to Arunachal residents, India strongly raised the matter with the Chinese Foreign Ministry, but was met with the same response that China had a "consistent" visa policy for disputed territories.Last year, both countries were able to resolve another visa row — over Jammu and Kashmir — with China quietly withdrawing stapled visas that it began issuing in 2009 to residents of J&K. China's shift in stance followed a strong Indian reaction which included the suspension of defence exchanges.

The growing political tensions between the US

The growing political tensions between the US and Russia,'bined with increasing friction between the anti-gay law passed by Russian parliament and the pro-gay attitudes of US pop stars, has led some to suggest that Russia could form a musical Iron Curtain to keep western acts out. But is this really the case?One of Russia's leading concert promoters believes that the current row – stoked during last week's athletics world championships in Moscow – will not lead to any conclusive ban, but he has his concerns.

Yevgeny Finkelshtein, president of PMI, which organised Madonna and Lady Gaga's concerts in St Petersburg, sent an open letter to President Vladimir Putin last week seeking the creation of a separate visa for artists, athletes and their entourages. The letter was signed by 27 industry figures, including prominent artists, event promoters and venue owners. "I wrote the letter to avoid any further scandals or interruptions in the arrival of foreign stars," Finkelshtein told the Guardian. His open letter also warns that any additional requirements or stiffening of the visa regime for artists and athletes will "inevitably lead to the country's isolation from world culture."

The Russian government has met widespread criticism from abroad for its recent clampdown on gay rights: Activists in the United States boycotted Russian vodka, while actor Stephen Fry spoke out against Russia hosting the Winter Olympics in Sochi next year. The uproar'es after Putin signed a federal law in June against the propaganda of "non-traditional sexual relations" among minors, following 10 regional laws passed against homosexual propaganda among minors in recent years.