China has imposed a range of sweeping new rules restricting travel in and out of the country in a move that observers say will give the government even more control over its citizens.
Citizens deemed to have “harmed” China’s national security or interests while overseas can also be barred from leaving China for up to three years.
But the law also says that it will apply to anyone considered a threat to the country’s industrial or technological security.
China keeps close scrutiny on sectors like semiconductors and AI, as the race between Beijing and Washington for tech dominance heats up. According to reports, travel restrictions were earlier imposed on some executives from these industries.
In March, the co-founders of Manus – an AI company that had been acquired by Meta – were reportedly barred from leaving China.
Under the new rules, border officials are now also required to advise Chinese nationals against travelling to countries and regions deemed “high-risk”.
But even prior to the rules being announced, some people were already restricted from going to certain countries. Civil servants were among the earliest groups subjected to these controls, which later expanded to include state-owned enterprise employees and ordinary citizens.
A retired grassroots civil servant in Anhui told BBC Chinese that around 2018, his workplace made employees surrender their passports. His passport remains in the custody of his former employer even though he retired last year.
According to the ex-civil servant, employees had to apply and explain their reasons for overseas travel, and not all requests were approved.
For example, trips to visit relatives were more likely to be approved than tourism trips, he said.
“It is mainly to prevent corrupt officials from fleeing or transferring assets abroad,” he said. “For more senior officials, it may also be intended to prevent the disclosure of state secrets.”
A man identified by his pseudonym, Xiao Wang, who works at a state-owned financial institution in Beijing, told BBC Chinese that his fellow employees have long been required to surrender their passports and get approval for overseas travel.
The 32-year-old said managers have verbally reminded staff that “sensitive countries such as Japan are definitely off-limits”.
Professor Tom Kellogg, Executive Director of the Center for Asian Law at Georgetown University, told BBC Chinese that the expanding travel restrictions were “deeply concerning” and said they reflect a “growing ideological control under Chinese leader Xi Jinping”, which is reminiscent of Mao Zedong’s era.
China was largely cut off from the world under Mao’s decades-long regime, and international travel only became a part of life for Chinese people in the 1990s, after China underwent a series of reforms and opening up.
Today’s various travel restrictions, Kellogg said, “bring back memories of that painful era”.
