China is getting punished left, right and centre for its belligerence, expansionism and serious human rights violations. First, countries like Japan started decoupling from China and moving global supply chains away from the Dragon. Then, the US and India started inflicting damage upon China’s tech sector. And now, the democratic world is looking to kill China’s tourism and hospitality sector.
According to The Guardian, the United States and the United Kingdom have warned of the risk of arbitrary arrest in China and Hong Kong in their updated travel advisory for citizens. This is essentially a fallout of the brutal crackdown against dissenters by China’s Communist regime and Beijing’s “hostage diplomacy” that attacks nationals of other countries visiting China. It seems like a loud and clear message to the people of China- overthrow the CCP, or else CCP will kill your country.
The US has therefore advised its citizens to “reconsider travel” to the city of Hong Kong while emphasising how the Chinese government “unilaterally and arbitrarily exercises police and security power” in the former British colony.
The UK has, on the other hand, has highlighted how China has been detaining foreign nationals on the flimsy ground of “endangering national security”. The new British travel advice states, “There is also a risk of arbitrary detention, including of British nationals.”
Similar signals are coming from Canberra too. And Australia isn’t worried about just about travellers and tourists alone. According to Australian Financial Review,dozens of big Australian companies are now reviewing the safety of their expatriate staff stationed in China, and are reassessing whether to send employees back to Chinese cities of Shanghai and Beijing this month.
If countries are worried about sending their citizens to China, then it is only the CCP administration which is to be blamed for this. A spate of arbitrary detentions in the Communist country is what has prompted the democratic world to reassess whether their citizens should travel to China.
Several foreigners have been subjected to arbitrary detentions by Beijing in recent months over national security charges. Canadians, Australians, Japanese and at least one American- China have tried to crack down upon citizens of every single country that doesn’t share very good relations with the Dragon.
Take for example the case of Cheng Lei, an Australian television anchor for the Chinese State-run media outlet, CGTN. Recently, she was taken into detention by Chinese authorities without being charged with any offence. She is being kept under “residential surveillance at a designated location”.
In fact, China was also planning to abduct another two Australia journalists- Bill Birtles of the Australian Broadcasting Corporation and Mike Smith of the Australian Financial Review, but the hostage attempt was foiled by Australian authorities.
China is looking to settle scores with Canberra through such arbitrary detentions amidst the deteriorating Sino-Australian ties. In fact, Australia’s Department of Foreign Affairs and Trade had only recently warned, “Australians may also be at risk of arbitrary detention,” in China.
China has been using such below-the-belt tricks with the democratic world for quite some time now. Take for example Michael Kovrig, a former Canadian diplomat, and Michael Spavor, a Canadian businessman, who has been under Chinese detention since 2018 as a tit-for-tat measure against the arrest of Huawei Chief Financial Officer (CFO) Meng Wanzhou by Canada in December 2018, on an extradition request from the United States.
It is such arbitrary detentions which are forcing the world to reconsider travelling to China. China itself remains a booming tourist economy and in 2015, it was the fourth most popular international tourist destination in the world with an annual 56.9 million tourists. But can the world cannot trust Beijing with the safety of its own citizens any longer. India, Australia, the US, the UK, Japan, South Korea and the ASEAN- almost every State is bound to reassess travel safety in China.
It is just a matter of time before the Chinese detentions and reactions from the rest of the world start prejudicing the booming tourism sector of China. If China cannot behave properly with the citizens of other countries, there is no reason why other countries should let China enrich itself with their money.
Any drawdown in the number of foreigners visiting China will not only bring down the Chinese tourist economy, but it will also have major repercussions on other sectors from Aviation to hospitality and even local transport.
Ultimately, as private enterprises also realise the risks of posting staff into China, more and more multinational companies will feel the urge to shift production/ services out of China. The Chinese exports-based economy is therefore headed towards a major catastrophe that would see a hike in inflation and destitution of the Chinese citizens. CCP’s actions are killing almost all sectors of the Chinese economy. The biggest victims of the CCP’s repressive policies are going to be the citizens of China.
And therefore, by resorting to countermeasures, the world is prompting the Chinese people to take control of their country, or else CCP will not shy away from destroying it.