Taiwan maintains China tour group ban after fatal bus accident

Taipei, April 28 (CNA) Taiwan's Mainland Affairs Council (MAC) said Monday it will not lift a ban on local travel agencies soliciting package group tours to China until the "personal freedom and travel safety" of Taiwanese travelers can be ensured, amid criticism following a recent fatal bus accident in China.

MAC, Taiwan's top government agency for handling cross-Taiwan Strait affairs, made the statement after a Taiwanese tour group was involved in a bus accident in China's Gansu Province last Friday, leaving one Taiwanese national dead and 12 others injured.

The accident prompted criticism that Taiwan's ban on China-bound tour groups -- in place since early 2020 -- has become a mere formality, with some travel agencies in Taiwan allegedly using "modified" tour arrangements to circumvent the rules, potentially weakening protections for Taiwanese travelers.

In the statement issued Monday evening, MAC defended its policy, saying the Gansu accident was "simply a travel accident."

The agency said that although the group of more than 30 Taiwanese travelers was "self organized" by relatives and friends, the Taiwanese travel agency tasked to handle the trip had purchased the required liability insurance and assigned a tour guide to accompany the group, all of which complies with current regulations.

"The fact that it was not a tour group organized by a travel agency did not affect travelers' rights or weaken their protections," MAC said.

The agency went on to say that given travel to China remains under an "orange" alert, travel agencies in Taiwan will only be allowed to resume organizing China-bound tour groups "on the premise that the personal freedom and travel safety of Taiwanese nationals traveling to China can be ensured."

Taiwan raised the travel alert for China, Hong Kong and Macao to the second-highest "orange" alert level on June 27, 2024, advising citizens to avoid unnecessary travel to these regions due to increasing safety concerns.

MAC said the "main reason" the ban on travel agencies arranging pre-packaged tour groups to China cannot be lifted is that Beijing has continued to expand its national security laws in recent years.

The agency cited China's June 2024 "guidelines" targeting what Beijing calls "Taiwan independence" separatists, as well as its encouragement of public reporting, saying these measures "seriously threaten the personal safety of Taiwanese nationals traveling to China, Hong Kong and Macao."

According to MAC, from Jan. 1, 2024 to March 31, 2026, Taiwanese authorities received reports involving 330 Taiwanese nationals who went missing or were detained in China, Hong Kong or Macao.

Taiwan has banned China-bound group tours since early 2020 during the COVID-19 pandemic, but individual travel by Taiwanese nationals to China is not subject to the same ban.

The Tourism Administration confirmed with CNA on Tuesday that the Gansu tour did not constitute a violation of the ban, as the ban only prohibits travel agencies from recruiting "unspecified members of the public" for group tours to China.

Self-organized groups, in which members of the public find their own participants before asking a travel agency to make the arrangements, do not violate the ban, the administration said.