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Chinese nationals gather outside the Kathmandu international airport. Photo: Reuters

Chinese fly out of Nepal but some seats come at a steep price

Beijing acted quickly to evacuate Chinese tourists stranded in Kathmandu, with roughly 1,000 expected to have flown home on Sunday amid reports that some carriers had raised ticket prices.

Beijing acted quickly yesterday to evacuate Chinese tourists stranded in Kathmandu, with roughly 1,000 expected to have flown home yesterday amid reports that some carriers had raised ticket prices.

State television reported that the nationals would be flown home on nine passenger flights, including two chartered ones, with a total capacity of about 1,100 seats.

At the request of the Chinese embassy in Kathmandu, China Southern Airlines sent an extra aircraft yesterday to pick up the tourists.

Embassy staff were also at the airport in the Nepalese capital to help Chinese tourists secure flights, intervening after at least one Chinese carrier allegedly ramped up ticket prices.

"Some airlines have lifted the price of a ticket to 13,000 yuan (HK$16,500). Cashing in on another country's disaster seriously tarnishes our national image," embassy military attache Senior Colonel Liu Xiaoguang was quoted by the Sohu news portal as saying. "I want to smack them."

A one-way ticket for the same route in two weeks' time costs about 2,500 yuan on various travel websites. Most tickets from Kathmandu to Guangzhou were sold out and the lowest price, offered by China Southern, was nearly 8,000 yuan yesterday.

A 23-year-old woman from Zhejiang province said she and four people she was travelling with were waiting at their hotel after trying to find a flight out of Kathmandu yesterday.

"The ticket price was ridiculously high, and we can't afford 8,000 yuan for a ticket, so we are waiting," she told the .

Liu advised mainland visitors stranded at the airport not to buy overpriced tickets, and those who had already bought them to tell the embassy because "the embassy and government will follow up seriously", Sohu reported.

Liu told the Chinese military's online news outlet late yesterday that the embassy helped about 1,000 nationals return home, and more than 600 were still at the airport. About 1,000 more Chinese visitors were on their way to the airport.

One tourist told state-run CCTV that there was panic when the quake struck "but here we are getting on board a flight back home within 24 hours". "It makes me feel fortunate to be Chinese," she said.

In Beijing, Foreign Minister Wang Yi called an emergency meeting with various departments yesterday, pledging to help Chinese nationals get home and to support relief efforts in the quake's aftermath.

This article appeared in the South China Morning Post print edition as: Flights home but some at a steep price
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