Southeast Asia has no plans to restrict Chinese tourists

Cambodian Prime Minister Hun Sen said on Monday his country is an “attractive destination” for Chinese and “does not require Chinese people to do anything, just to come as normal tourists,” Khmer Times reported.

Before the outbreak in 2020, Cambodia was receiving more than two million Chinese tourists a year, or nearly 40% of all international arrivals.

Indonesia has not announced any plans to tighten entry restrictions for travelers from China.

“There is no immediate need to change the existing policy but we will continue to monitor the situation,” Bloomberg quoted Covid Task Force spokesman Wiku Adisasmito as saying.

All foreign travelers entering Indonesia are required to show proof of complete vaccination against the coronavirus.

As a tourism-reliant economy, Thailand is waiting for the return of Chinese tourists.

Its national communicable diseases committee has proposed to the Thai government Chinese tourists arriving in Thailand will be treated like other foreign visitors, have to furnish a vaccination certificate but not be required to undergo tests on arrival.

In 2019 Chinese had accounted for 28% of the nearly 40 million international visitors to the country.

The Singaporean government too has said there would be no changes in Covid-19 measures for travelers from China.

Foreigners who are not fully vaccinated need to undergo pre-departure tests before they can enter the island state while short-term visitors are required to buy insurance for Covid-related medical expenses.

Malaysia said it will screen all inbound travelers for fever and test wastewater from aircraft arriving from China for Covid-19.

In Vietnam, where tourism used to rely heavily on Chinese visitors before the pandemic, medical experts have urged the government to not ban or mandate Covid tests for people coming from China.

China was in fact the biggest source of tourist arrivals prior to the pandemic, with nearly 5.8 million Chinese coming in 2019.

The country only received 3.6 million foreign tourists last year, or 70% of its target, and targets eight million this year, bolstered by China’s announcement it is reopening tourism.