China Bans Foreigners from Visiting Tibet Until July, Media Reports Say[Tuesday, 14 June 2011, 5:09 p.m.]
DHARAMSHALA:
The Chinese government has enforced ban on foreign tourists as well as
non-Chinese researchers and scholars from visiting Tibet until 26 July,
according to reports from Radio Free Asia and the AFP news agency.”At
the moment we’re not admitting foreign tourists,” an employee at China
Travel Service in Tibet’s capital Lhasa told AFP. The employee said the
agency had received a notice saying this would be enforced until 26
July.A worker at the Tibet Youth Travel Service agency
confirmed the ban, saying it begins on Tuesday and was linked to
celebrations marking the 60th anniversary of China’s rule over Tibet,
reportedly scheduled for July.A separate travel agent from
Lhasa told Radio Free Asia that “No travel agencies will take
foreigners into Tibet. There must be something political, something the
government does not want them to see.”“Some scholars, Western
scholars also, have been told they won’t be able to come during that
period to do research … Many Tibetans who came from Qinghai and Yunnan
were told to return home by the end of June, and Tibetan businessmen
without official permits have also been told to leave Lhasa and return
to their hometowns”, RFA quoted Robert Barnett, a Tibet scholar as saying.Earlier
in April this year, the Chinese government enforced ban on foreigners
from entering the Tibetan areas of Karze and Ngaba following its
crackdown on Kirti monastery.
