China, India among 35 countries added to Sri Lanka visa-free list to boost tourism

Tourists will be given 30-day visas under a six-month pilot programme that will start from October 1

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Tourists visit an elephant park in Sri Lanka on August 11. Photo: Xinhua

Published: 4:06pm, 22 Aug 2024

Sri Lanka’s cabinet approved issuing free tourist visas to visitors from 35 countries including China, India and Russia, a top official said on Thursday, in an effort to boost tourism and help revive its crisis-hit economy.

Tourists will be given 30-day visas under a six-month pilot programme that will start from October 1, said cabinet spokesman and Transport Minister Bandula Gunawardana.

“The aim of the government is to transform Sri Lanka into a free visa country, much like Singapore, Thailand, and Vietnam to tap into the benefits of a rapidly growing tourism industry,” Gunawardana told reporters at a weekly cabinet briefing.

The extensive list includes India, China, the UK, Germany, the Netherlands, Belgium, Spain, Australia, Denmark, Poland, Kazakhstan, Saudi Arabia, the UAE, Nepal, Indonesia, Russia, Thailand, Malaysia, Japan, and France.

The country of 22 million people, famed for its beaches, ancient temples and aromatic tea, saw its tourism industry pummelled first by the Covid-19 pandemic and then by a severe financial crisis in 2022 that saw mass scale protests and shortages of essentials such as fuel.

But the tourism industry is reaping the benefits of a turnaround that began last year with Sri Lanka clocking nearly 2 million arrivals by mid-August, for the first time since 2019.