Chinese language artist Ai Weiwei was lately barred from getting into Switzerland after he was unable to supply a customer’s visa. In keeping with an Instagram publish by Ai, he spent the night of February 10 on a bench on the Zurich airport.
Ai’s Instagram publish was captioned with: “‘That is Switzerland, not Portugal’ they advised me. I’m sleeping on a bench with a blanket tonight, ready to be deported subsequent morning at 6:50AM.”
The Instagram publish included a number of photographs and movies of the airport, his passport, and paperwork, in addition to the discover of refusal of entry on the border. The latter acknowledged Ai didn’t have a visa.
Chinese language passport holders are required to get a Swiss Schengen Visa to go to the nation for tourism, enterprise, visiting family and friends, and quick examine applications.
The artist has been dwelling within the Portuguese metropolis of Montemor-o-Novo, outdoors Lisbon, since 2013.
In one of many photographs Ai uploaded to Instagram, he included the flight quantity BA709, a British Airways flight scheduled to go away Zurich for London at 6:50 a.m. on February 11.
A spokesperson for the Zurich cantonal police advised the Keystone-SDA information company that Ai didn’t have the required entry paperwork to go to Switzerland. The police spokesperson additionally famous Ai was not arrested and was capable of transfer round freely within the airport’s transit space till his return to his nation of origin.
The information of the Chinese language artist’s refusal for entry into Switzerland was first reported by swissinfo.ch, a part of the Swiss Broadcasting Company.
