Chinese travelers cancel Lunar New Year trips to Thailand over safety concerns

Chinese travelers are canceling plans to visit Thailand during the Lunar New Year holiday, as concerns over the kidnapping of actor Wang Xing continue to reverberate through the country.

Net booking volume for trips to Thailand fell 15.6% from Jan. 13 to Jan. 20 from the previous week, after news of the rescue of Wang from a scamming compound along the Thai-Myanmar border this month, according to the marketing agency China Trading Desk.

The fallout is also extending to other countries in Southeast Asia, with data from the aviation analytics company VariFlight showing Chinese travelers also canceled holiday trips to Vietnam, Singapore, Indonesia and Malaysia — albeit to a lesser degree, according to the company’s CEO, Subramania Bhatt.