Dream holiday turns to nightmare after family are threatened with being locked up

A FA M I LY ’ S d r e a m hol id ay t u r ned i nto a n i g h t ma r e a f t e r they were threatened with being locked up by Ch i nese c ustoms officials minutes after landing in the country.

They were split up at the border and warned they had a choice between leaving or going to jail – because three of them had Turkish stamps on their passports.

Twins Richard and Martin Low, along with family and friends, had jetted to Beijing to start a cruise which would have eventually taken them to Japan.

But on landing in the Chinese capital to start their holiday, which had doubled as Dundee man Richard’s honeymoon, they found themselves in a battle with border officials.

Martin and parents Linda and Gavin Low were singled out by officials and taken into a holding room, while the remaining eight members of the group were allowed to enter China.

The three were detained for several hours without food and water and, at one point, Martin was asked to hand over his watch to be scanned after he protested.

However, when he accidentally dropped and smashed it, he was mocked by border officals.

“I wear the watch in defiance really, even though it is damaged,” the Newport man said.

“We were split up as soon as we landed in Beijing and, despite having 144-hour visas, we were denied entry to the country.

“The three of us were then warned if we didn’t get a flight straight out of China within 24 hours we would be put in jail.

“There were armed police about so it was traumatic to say the least.

“Now we are battling with our insurance company to get some of the holiday costs refunded and of course the cost of the other flights.

“This has been happening to a lot of people with 144-hour visas, but there was no explanation.

“It was a struggle to try to connect to the internet on my phone and book flights because it is restricted in China, but we managed.”

Martin claims the three of them spent more than £3,500 in total as a result.

He said he had since set up a Facebook page for people who had gone through similar experiences, which has been inundated with responses.

Meanwhile, Richard said the debacle had wrecked what was supposed to be the trip of a lifetime.

The 34-year-old civil servant, from Clatto Woods, slammed the treatment of his family and vowed he would never return to the Asian country.

“A total of 11 people made the trip to Beijing to start a cruise from Tianjin to Hong Kong, Vietnam, Singapore and Japan,” he said.

“It was meant to be the holiday of a lifetime, but turned into a nightmare.

“It basically cost £2,000 per person, but my parents and twin brother had to fork out another £1,500 to get to Japan with flights and accommodation during the Rugby World Cup.

“It was basically my honeymoon after my wife Andrea and I got married and then we made it a holiday of a lifetime.

“But there was a problem when we arrived and we were separated. It was awful.”

The Chinese consulate i n Edinburgh was contacted for comment, but failed to respond.

However, a spokesman for the Chinese Visa Agency, also based in the capital, said: “In terms of having a stamp on your passport from Turkey, it is quite i mportant for those stamps to be very clear.

“It has to clearly show when a person entered and left the country. If it is not clear then it causes a problem and in our experience Turkey is one of the countries with problems. But I’m not able to say why.”