The National Tourism Administration and the Tourism Department of the Russian Federation recently signed the Meeting Minutes for the 2nd Conference of the Tourism Sub-commission of the Russian-Chinese Cooperation Commission of Education, Culture, Healthcare and Sport and determined the affairs involved in this autumn's Chinese group tours for visiting Russia.  

This signifies that after three years of preparation, the final procedures for Chinese citizens to organize tours to visit Russia have been completed.

Sources revealed that Russian authorities will hand over the list of travel agencies authorized by Chinese authorities to organize tours to various Russian border checkpoints. At present, there are 672 Chinese travel agencies authorized to put together sightseeing tours to Russia.

In 2004, 810,000 Chinese citizens visited Russia, increasing 22.4% over the previous year. Estimates put this figures at 1 million in 2006.

(Chinanews.cn June 23, 2005)