China tourism chiefs urge ban of Japan chain
Beijing – 23 January 2017
1China’s tourism administration has urged tour operators to sever ties with a Japanese hotel chain after an escalating row over the hotelier’s denial of the 1937 massacre by Japanese troops in the Chinese city of Nanjing, Reuters reported.
A furore erupted this month over books by Toshio Motoya, president of Tokyo-based hotel and real estate developer APA Group, that air his revisionist views and are placed in every room of the firm’s more than 400 hotels.
Motoya, using the pen name Seiji Fuji, wrote that stories of the Nanjing massacre were “impossible” saying: “These acts were all said to be committed by the Japanese army, but this is not true.”
The China National Tourism Administration is firmly opposed to APA Group’s “provocation” of Chinese tourists, spokesman Zhang Lizhong said.
“We demand that all operators with international tours and online platforms completely stop all cooperation with this hotel,” Zhang said in a statement on the body’s website.
“We call on Chinese groups and the many tourists that visit Japan to resist APA’s wrong approach and avoid spending money at this hotel.”
APA did not immediately respond to requests for comment.