Pakistan protests China visa 'ban'

A pakistani woman is escorted from the Foreign Ministry in Hong Kong after being denied a visa to visit China

By CNN's Craig Francis

HONG KONG, China -- Pakistani officials have lodged a formal protest against an apparent ban on its nationals resident in Hong Kong from visiting China.

Pakistan's Consul-General Azmat Ali Rangha confirmed to CNN that the matter had been raised formally with the central Government in Hong Kong but declined to discuss the matter further.

The unannounced ban on Pakistanis traveling to China from Hong Kong has seemingly been in place for about two weeks and has hit the many Hong Kong-based Pakistani businesses with Chinese trade links hard.

China has long been an ally of Pakistan's, with Hong Kong home to some 25,000 Pakistan nationals.

Speaking outside the Ministry of Foreign Affairs Office in Hong Kong, Pakistani national Abdul Rahim Khan told CNN that no reasons were being offered by the ministry for the refusal to issue China visit visas.

Turned down

"Visa applications for my sister and mother (pictured above) were turned down for no reason. My mother wanted to go to China to visit her mother which seems not to be an unusual request," said Khan.

"We were told to go to the consulate in Bangladesh if we wanted to travel to China but given no reason why," he said.

Businessmen Hafiz Iman Janjooa, 31, who was refused a visa and quoted by the South China Morning Post, said he believed the ban was linked to the U.S. strikes on Afghanistan.

"The war is between Afghanistan and the U.S.," he said. "What has it got to do with us?"

Bilateral relations secure

China's Ministry of Foreign Affairs in Hong Kong denied that it had refused visas to Pakistani people, but said in the cases, it "could not issue them in the period of time requested", said the Post.

China has recently sealed its frontier with Afghanistan and deployed extra troops to the remote border region.

However, the border with Pakistan remains open and, according to Lingnan University Hong Kong Assistant Professor of International Relations, Dr Ren Yue, that fact should indicates no serious deterioration of relations between China and Pakistan.

"China would not do anything sensitive to bilateral relations with Pakistan right now, so the visa matter is probably a precautionary security measure," Dr Ren told CNN.