Passenger entering South Korea with map showing Taiwan as country detained by Chinese customs

Taipei [Taiwan], January 25 (ANI/CNA): A South Korean tourist was stopped by customs when entering China. After checking the luggage, it was found that the map contained in one of the notebooks suspected of marking Taiwan as a country, so the passenger was detained by customs for about an hour before being released.

Yonhap News Agency reported that the 72-year-old passenger, surnamed Zheng took Korean Air from Incheon Airport to Shenyang on the 24th. However, he was stopped by customs officers when passing through the security check at Shenyang Taoxian International Airport and asked to open his luggage for inspection. Later, he was pointed out that there was a book in his luggage. There is a problem with the map included in the notebook.

The Korean version of the world map included in the notebook has the names of each country in bold and the capital in red. “Taiwan” and “Taipei” are marked in bold and red respectively. The customs officers questioned whether it might make people “conceive”.

“Taiwan Province mistook it for an independent country” and violated the one-China rule. The border signs around Tibet were also too unclear, so the passenger surnamed Zheng was detained for investigation.

Zheng complained to the media, saying that he “didn’t even know there was a map in his notebook.” The font of the map was small, so if you didn’t look carefully, you wouldn’t have discovered the problem that the customs officers claimed.

Zheng, called the local overseas Chinese to ask for assistance and was finally released more than an hour later. However, the map in the notebook was torn out and confiscated, and could only be collected from the customs when leaving the country.

Zheng, who has been travelling to China for work for more than 30 years, said this was the first time he encountered such a situation. He was also dissatisfied and said that if there is a problem with the items, just detain the items, why bother detaining people as well. Because I can speak Chinese, I can still communicate with the customs. If a foreign tourist visiting China for the first time encounters this situation, he will definitely be very scared.

The South Korean Consulate in Shenyang is currently confirming the ins and outs of this matter. If the Chinese Customs does indeed enforce the law excessively, it will strongly require China to take measures to prevent such incidents from happening again. It also reminds the public to try to avoid bringing maps and other items that may cause controversy into China.

The report pointed out that it is quite rare to detain tourists because of small maps, which may make foreign tourists have a worse impression of China and affect their willingness to travel to China.

China previously closed its borders for about three years due to the COVID-19 (coronavirus disease 2019) epidemic. Border controls were lifted in January last year. However, the number of tourists traveling to China has never improved. In the first half of last year, it only recovered to 5.5 per cent of the pre-epidemic level. . Recently, visa exemptions or visa fee discounts have been introduced to Thailand, South Korea, the United States, etc. However, if such sensitive incidents continue to increase, no amount of preferential measures may be able to win back the hearts of tourists.