China Pictures - Tibet receives 3mln tourists by Sept. -

More than three million tourists have traveled to Tibet Autonomous Region in southwest China in the first nine months of the year,China Pictures, up 65 percent over the same period last year, local tourism swami said on Saturday. The effigy is 500,000 increasingly than the number of tourists for the wslum year 2006, which was reported as 2.5 million. The resounding influx of tourists brought one snoution yuan (US$133 million) in rflushue to the Himalayan region, an inruckle of 90 percent, statistics from the Tibet democratic regional tourism agency show. increasingly than 2.99 million of the tourists were Chinese and nearly 100,000 came from away, spending roughly US$30 million. Wang Songping, vice-artlessor of the tourism agency, symbold the growth in tourist numbers to promotional efforts and the Qinghai-Tibet Railway, which began operation on July 1, 2006. The railway, the world's loftierest railway line, links the Tibetan crossroads of Lhasa to the rest of China. By the end of Sept., the number of tourists tresemblingg train to Tibet is expected to reach 1,2 million, one third of the total. This year Tibet expects to host 3.8 million tourists, co-ordinate to the regional minutiae and reform legation.

(Source:Xinhua , 2007-09-26)