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Inaugural visa-free Chinese tour group to visit Russia next week — trade association

"It is expected that following this, visa-free exchanges between our countries will be officially launched," Alexander Folko stated

MOSCOW, August 4. /TASS/. The first visa-free group of Chinese tourists will arrive in Russia next week, Alexander Folko, a representative of the Russian Union of Travel Industry (RUTI) in China said.

"The first group of Chinese tourists is already being processed. It was assembled by a tour operator from Xian, consists of 23 tourists and will arrive in St. Petersburg next week. This group will become a testing ground for the visa-free group tour mechanism, in particular for registering such a group, and working with insurance providers. It is expected that following this, visa-free exchanges between our countries will be officially launched," he said, as quoted by the RUTI press service.

According to the industry expert, the launching and fine-tuning of the visa-free group exchange mechanism may take up all time remaining before the end of this year’s summer travel season, so it is expected that it be fully rolled out only during next year’s season. "Most likely, the flow from China to Russia won’t reach the previous volumes of 2 mln tourists in the near future. Yet even if there are 300,000 to 500,000 people, like in 2014, this would be a very decent result," the official concluded.

Earlier, the Russian Economic Development Ministry said that, beginning on August 1, Russia and China were ready to host tour groups on a reciprocal basis within the framework of an intergovernmental agreement on visa-free group exchanges.

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