THE Chinese Embassy denied Tuesday night, October 11, 2022, Senate President Juan Miguel Zubiri’s announcement that the Chinese government has included the Philippines under its blacklist of tourist destinations.
“China has not placed the Philippines on its blacklist for tourism...The report of ‘tourist blacklist’ is misinformation,” said the Chinese Embassy in a statement sent to media Tuesday night.
The clarification came after Zubiri said Tuesday that the blacklisting was done amid the incidents of kidnapping and abuse related to the Philippine Offshore Gaming Operations (Pogo).
“Ambassador Huang said that the Philippines now is part of a blacklist of tourist sites because they do not know if a tourist will be joining Pogo operations and they don't know if their nationals who go to the Philippines will be safe from illegal activities being done by the triad, by the syndicates operating Pogos,” Zubiri said during the Senate ways and means committee hearing on Pogo.
“They may be kidnapped, mistaken for Pogo operators. That’s the reason why there’s been a significant drop in Chinese tourists. By the way, they are the largest number of tourists pre-pandemic,” he added.
Zubiri was referring to Chinese Ambassador to the Philippines Huang Xilian who paid him a courtesy visit on Monday, October 10.
In another statement posted Facebook late Tuesday, the Ambassador said the meeting between him and the Philippines officials on Monday was “warm and fruitful.”
“Ambassador Huang Xilian had a warm and fruitful meeting yesterday with Senate President Juan Miguel Zubiri, Senator Win Gatchalian and Senator Robin Padilla. They exchanged views on further strengthening the relationship between China and the Philippines and discussed practical cooperation on renewable energy, electrical cars, e-commerce, people-to-people and cultural exchanges, as well as cracking down on POGO-related crimes among others,” read the statement.
He reiterated China’s policy on and firm opposition to Pogo.
“According to Chinese law and regulations, Chinese citizens gambling overseas, opening casinos to attract Chinese citizens as primary customers constitute gambling crimes. Criminal liability can be pursued in accordance with the provisions of the Criminal Law of China. Chinese government and law enforcement have been taking tough measures to combat all forms of gambling,” he said.
He said most of the recent crimes targeted at Chinese citizens in the Philippines were related to Pogo.
He said the Chinese Embassy has been in close communication with the Philippine law enforcement agencies and has stepped up cooperation on cracking down Pogo-related criminal activities against Chinese citizens in the Philippines.
“Crimes induced by and associated with Pogo not only harm China’s interests and China-Philippines relations, but also hurt the interests of the Philippines. It is therefore widely believed that social costs of Pogo far outweigh its economic benefits to the Philippines in the long run and Pogo should be tackled from the root so as to address the social ills in a sweeping manner,” he added.
As to the “tourist blacklist” issue, Huang said tourism is an important component of practical cooperation between China and the Philippines and that it helped further deepen their long-time friendship.
“Before the Covid-19 pandemic close to two million Chinese nationals traveled to the Philippines in 2019, making China the second largest source of tourists. We expect more Chinese tourists to come to this country after the pandemic,” the Ambassador said.
In an interview with dzBB, Zubiri said it must have been “lost in translation.”
“Siguro, nagkamali ang Ambassador baka hindi niya ibig sabihin na blacklisted tayo ngayon, baka posibleng ma-blacklist tayo. Baka iyan ang clarification ng ating mahal na Ambassador,” he said.
(Maybe, the Ambassador made a mistake, maybe he didn't mean to blacklist us now, maybe we could be blacklisted. Maybe that is the clarification of our dear Ambassador.)
He said he was just a “messenger” and the term “blacklist” did not come from him. “Yung salitang yan galing kay Ambassdor Huang (That word came from Ambassador Huang).” (LMY/SunStar Philippines)