Six more countries have been added to the visa_free _circle of friends_ today. China continues to launch a series of practical measures

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Beijing, March 13 (Xinhua)– six more countries! The expansion of visa-free moments sends a strong signal of China’s opening up.

Reporter

Starting from March 14, China will try out the visa-free policy for ordinary passport holders in Switzerland, Ireland, Hungary, Austria, Belgium and Luxembourg. This is another expansion of China’s visa-free circle of friends following the formal entry into force of the China-Thailand visa abolition agreement on the 1st of this month.

According to the relevant arrangements, people from Switzerland and other six countries who hold ordinary passports to China for business, sightseeing, visiting relatives and friends and transit for no more than 15 days from March 14 to November 30 in 2024 can enter China visa-free. People from the above-mentioned countries who do not meet the visa-free conditions are still required to apply for a visa to come to China before entering the country.

As of early March, China had concluded visa abolition agreements covering different passports with 157 countries and reached visa simplification agreements or arrangements with 44 countries. Including Singapore, Antigua and Barbuda and Thailand, which have signed visa abolition agreements with China since the beginning of this year, 23 countries have implemented comprehensive visa abolition arrangements with China. In addition, more than 60 countries and regions have granted Chinese citizens visa-free or visa-on-arrival treatment.

Leon, a Swiss businessman, runs a tourism service in Geneva and has many Chinese partners. He said that after China’s visa-free entry into force for Switzerland, it will be more convenient to visit friends or discuss cooperation in China. I believe there will be more Swiss like me, planning to go to China for a visit.

For some time, the Chinese side has continuously introduced a number of visa optimization measures to come to China, including reducing the contents of visa application forms, reducing visa fees in stages, simplifying the examination and approval procedures for studying in China, exempting some applicants from fingerprints, visa-free appointments, and trying out visa-free policies for some countries, to further solve the difficulties and congestion points of foreigners coming to China.

During the Spring Festival this year, the number of inbound tourists from China reached 3.23 million, and the number of visa-free tourists from France, Germany, Malaysia and Singapore increased significantly, and the total number of inbound travel orders from these countries doubled compared with the same period in 2019.

The Chinese side also continues to launch a series of practical measures to make life convenient for foreigners and make them feel at home.

In order to better meet the diversified payment service needs of groups, including foreign visitors to China, the “opinions on further optimizing payment Services to enhance payment convenience” was officially released on March 7. a series of requirements are put forward in improving the environment for accepting bank cards, continuously optimizing the environment for the use of cash, and improving the convenience of mobile payment.

In addition, in view of the practical problems encountered by foreign visitors in using mobile payment, the people’s Bank of China instructs Alipay and Tenpay to optimize their business processes, improve the efficiency of binding overseas bank cards, and simplify identity verification arrangements while effectively protecting the security of personal information. Major payment institutions are instructed to raise the limit of individual transactions for foreign visitors to China to use mobile payments from US $1000 to US $5000, and the annual cumulative transaction limit from US $10,000 to US $50, 000.

In various scenes that are closely related to people’s lives, such as food, housing, transportation, travel, shopping, entertainment, and medicine, the small move of getting through the last kilometer one by one reflects the consideration of constantly improving the level of international service and promoting people-to-people exchanges between China and foreign countries.

Continuously improve the convenience of Chinese and foreign personnel exchanges and foreign personnel in China, taking into account the actual needs of people in Sino-foreign exchanges, has a strong realistic pertinence, but also in line with the trend of world integration and development. Su Xiaohui, an associate researcher at the China Academy of International Studies, said that the release of these good news and the acceleration of related work once again demonstrated China’s posture and sincerity in strengthening opening up and cooperation.

At the just-concluded national two sessions, China announced to the world a series of practical measures to promote high-level opening up to the outside world and strengthen international exchanges and cooperation.

We will step up efforts to attract foreign investment, promote the implementation of the eight actions to support high-quality co-building of Belt and Road Initiative, and do a good job in international cooperation platforms such as the entry Expo, the Service Trade Fair, the Consumer Expo and the chain Expo. In the bright picture of holding the new session of the Forum on China-Africa Cooperation hand in hand and mutual benefit, the cake of cooperation between China and the rest of the world is bound to grow bigger and bigger.

Yang Mingjie, director of the China Institute of Modern International Relations, said that in the context of the weak global economic recovery, instability and uncertainty, the strong signal of openness and cooperation sent by China has injected more momentum and valuable certainty into promoting the common development of the world. The relationship between China and the world market will be closer and colorful.

Over the past few days, international media and scholars have expressed their confidence in the prospects of China’s opening up and development: China’s further opening up to the outside world provides growth opportunities for global partners and China’s new development provides new opportunities for the world. This is in line with the strong desire of the people of all countries for peaceful development.

Starting from spring, a vibrant China will write more wonderful stories about blending with the world and achieving each other. (reporters Wang Bin, permit, Shi Jingnan, Ren Qinqin, Zhu Chao, Wu Yue)