Tour boycott over boat fire
TAIWAN travel agents will stop organising tour groups to China immediately and cease mainland-related advertising until Chinese authorities give a clearer account of the Qiandao Lake tragedy in which 24 Taiwanese died.
At an emergency meeting in Taipei last night, the agents also demanded better protection for Taiwanese tourists in China as a condition for lifting their boycott.
The moves, and calls by legislators for even stronger action, reflect increasing doubts about the circumstances surrounding the deaths of 24 members of a Taiwanese tour group, and eight mainland guides and crew members, in a boat fire on Qiandao Lake, Zhejiang province, on March 31.
Local Chinese authorities have imposed a blackout on the incident and have blocked media from approaching or photographing the tour vessel.
Victims' relatives, who left on Sunday for the site, have also strongly protested against the treatment of the bodies.
According to Taiwan press reports, autopsies were carried out on several bodies without relatives' consent. The bodies will be cremated in Hangzhou, against the wishes of relatives, Taiwan state radio reported. Offers of humanitarian assistance had also been refused.
After an emergency meeting yesterday of travel-agent associations and related government officials called by the official Mainland Affairs Council, vice-chairman Su Chi said representatives had ''expressed grave dissatisfaction with the crude way'' in which mainland authorities had handled the incident.
The council called on Chinese authorities to ''swiftly investigate and publish the facts of the case'' and demanded that Beijing's Association for Relations Across the Taiwan Strait ''immediately allow [Straits Exchange Foundation] personnel to go to thesite to provide humanitarian assistance to the victims' relatives''.
Mr Su said the decision to boycott China was not legally binding, but representatives of all 13 travel-agent associations in Taiwan had agreed to call on members to observe the suspension.
However, tour groups from whom deposits already had been collected might still proceed, he said.
He estimated the suspension could affect about 20 per cent of the nearly two million person-visits to the mainland annually.
Hsu Chin-rei, chairman of the Taipei Travel Agents Association, added after the meeting that his and other travel agency associations ''will fully co-operate with the Government's moves''.
He said that if a ''proper response'' were not received, the mainland would be declared to be an extremely high-risk zone and ''from that day all tour groups will be banned from going to the mainland in order to safeguard the personal safety and rights of Taiwanese travellers''.
The chairman of the Taipei Travel Agents' Association, Hsu Chin-rei, said he would lead a six-member delegation with other agents to Beijing tomorrow. The association also would send a three-man team to Hangzhou to assist relatives of the Qiandao victims.
The SEF also will call on ARATS to open discussions promptly on cross-strait traveller safety and the establishment of a emergency notification system, Mr Su said.