New visa rules for travellers visiting China

The Ministry of Foreign Affairs on Monday confirmed that China has temporarily suspended the visa-free facility for Singaporeans who plan to travel to the country for 15 days or less, from July 1.

This means that Singapore ordinary passport holders will require a visa for entry into China for short stays of under two weeks, which is not necessary since 2003.

An MFA spokesman said the ministry was informed of the new requirement on Monday.

‘We have been given the assurance that the visa requirement is a temporary measure. The visa-free facility for travels of 15 days or less would be reinstated after the Beijing Olympics,’ added the spokesman.

‘The Chinese authorities have not informed us of the exact date when the visa-free facility will be reinstated.’ (story)

Singapore supports China during Tibet unrest

Singapore on Tuesday voiced support for China’s handling of unrest in Tibet and said there should be no ‘politicisation’ of the Olympic Games hosted by Beijing in August. ‘Singapore supports the declared policy of the Chinese government to protect the lives and property of its citizens from violent demonstrators with minimum use of force,’ a spokesman for the Ministry of Foreign Affairs said.

‘We are opposed to the politicisation of the Olympics.’

Beijing has repeatedly accused the Dalai Lama, Tibet’s exiled spiritual leader, of masterminding the protests, saying the unrest was a deliberate campaign to sabotage the Beijing Games. (story)

Singapore opposes Olympic games boycott

Singapore on Tuesday voiced its strong opposition to the calls to boycott the Beijing Olympic Games in August this year.

“The Ministry of Community Development, Youth and Sports opposes the call from some quarters to boycott the Beijing Olympic Games,” said the ministry in a statement on Tuesday night.

Singapore’s Minister for Community Development, Youth and Sports Vivian Balakrishnan said in the statement that a boycott will mean many missed opportunities for better cross-border and inter-cultural understanding.

It will also be a great disappointment for all the athletes who have trained so hard to fulfill their dreams of competing in the Olympics, he added.

The minister stressed that sports should be separated from politics.

“I believe it is vital to keep sporting competitions and politics separate. We must not let politics obstruct the celebration of sports and all that it stands for,” he said. (story)

Australian tourists taken hostage … briefly by Chinese man

Australian tourists briefly held hostage in China by a lone man armed with explosives on Thursday told of their ordeal as Canberra urged holidaymakers to heed travel warnings ahead of the Beijing Olympics.The man attacked a group of 10 Australian travel agents visiting the northwest city of Xi’an, famed as home of the Terracotta Warriors, on Wednesday before he was shot dead by a police sniper.

‘He was pacing up and down the bus, they couldn’t understand what he was saying. Then he turned around, opened up his jacket and he had a bomb strapped to him,’ said Sue Wynne, a friend of hostage Rhiannon Dunkley, after speaking to her.

Nine of the hostages were released by the man, but a 48-year-old woman was held captive for several hours before the gunman was killed.

Australian Foreign Minister Stephen Smith said there was nothing to suggest the Australians were deliberately targeted and the motive for the attack remained unclear.

‘We’ve asked for a full briefing to try to understand the motivation,’ Mr Smith told journalists in Melbourne.

The travel agents were on an educational tour to Beijing, Xi’an and Shanghai, organised by a Sydney-based travel wholesale company, when the attack took place. (story)

Edison “quits” HK entertainment industry

HK singer and actor Edison Chen said on Thursday that he would step away from the Hong Kong entertainment industry, in his first public appearance since a nude picture scandal broke in January.’I've decided to step away from the Hong Kong entertainment industry,’ Chen told reporters, while apologising to Hong Kong for the scandal which has drawn blanket media coverage over several weeks.

He said in a brief statement he would fulfil existing commitments before stepping down ‘indefinitely’.

Beijing police vow action on HK nude photos
Meanwhile in Beijing, Chinese police have vowed to detain anyone caught distributing nude photos of several Hong Kong pop stars that were recently posted on the Internet, state media reported on Thursday.

Hong Kong police said some 1,300 private shots of the celebrities had been stolen by the staff of a computer repair shop from a faulty laptop believed to belong to Canadian-born singer and actor Edison Chen.

The scandal has caused a media frenzy and feverish downloading and sharing of the photos. Hong Kong police have made several arrests and the investigation is ongoing. (story)

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Baidu.com blamed for spreading sexy Edison Chen photos

China’s top Internet search engine has been censured for allegedly helping spread sexually explicit photos. The government-sponsored watchdog group is demanding both action and an apology from Baidu.com over the online availability of the photos, which feature several Hong Kong celebrities.

The photos appear to show actor Edison Chen and several female stars performing sex acts or in sexually suggestive poses.

They are widely available in Hong Kong, where the scandal has dominated the headlines for several weeks.

The watchdog group, called the Beijing Association of Online Media, praised other Chinese sites such as NetEase.com, Sina.com and Sohu.com for urging their users not to spread the photos. (story)

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China made dumplings deliberately poisoned

Japan’s health minister on Tuesday said China-made dumplings may have been deliberately poisoned with pesticide as the number of Japanese reporting illness reaches the thousands.Pesticide was detected on the package wrapping and the frozen meat dumplings, triggering a nationwide scare that led major foodmakers to recall all food made at the factory near Beijing.

‘Taking into account the circumstantial evidence we have so far, we cannot help suspecting crime,’ Health Minister Yoichi Masuzoe told reporters.

A total of 3,742 people have said they became sick after eating the dumplings or other frozen food, the health ministry said in its latest figures, although it noted only 10 were diagnosed with pesticide poisoning. (story)