China opens visa-free entry for citizens of five European countries and Malaysia

From December 1, citizens of France, Germany, Italy, the Netherlands, Spain and Malaysia will be able to enter China without a visa for a period of 15 days. This program will be valid for one year. Such a step, according to the Ministry of Foreign Affairs, will contribute to the development of business, business relations and tourism. The agency reports this AP.

Before the COVID-19 pandemic, citizens of Brunei, Japan and Singapore had the right to visa-free entry into China. However, this practice was abandoned with the onset of the pandemic. And after the lifting of restrictive measures, visa-free entry in July of this year was restored only for citizens of Brunei and Singapore. And so far the flow of tourists to China has not returned to pre-pandemic levels. Thus, in the first six months of this year, 8.4 million foreign citizens visited China. And for the entire 2019, there were 977 million such visits.

Representatives of France have already welcomed the decision of the Chinese authorities. French Foreign Minister Catherine Colonna, who was visiting Beijing, said France, for its part, had decided to allow Chinese students who completed their master’s degrees in France to stay in the country for another five years “to promote exchange.” In turn, representatives of the EU Chamber of Commerce in China expressed hope that in the near future citizens of other European countries will be able to travel visa-free to China, and this will be “a significant and worthwhile improvement, which will also lead to increased business confidence.”

Alena Miklashevskaya