The Strangest Tourist Traps
From Xinjiang to Nagorno-Karabakh.
In China’s Xinjiang region, fake dinosaurs loom over visitors not far from where authorities have detained ethnic minorities in internment camps. In Shusha, Nagorno-Karabakh, the site of a bloody battle in 2020 now boasts renovated hotels. And in Kashmir, India recently hosted a G-20 summit on tourism, despite ongoing separatist violence in the region.
In China’s Xinjiang region, fake dinosaurs loom over visitors not far from where authorities have detained ethnic minorities in internment camps. In Shusha, Nagorno-Karabakh, the site of a bloody battle in 2020 now boasts renovated hotels. And in Kashmir, India recently hosted a G-20 summit on tourism, despite ongoing separatist violence in the region.
This edition of Flash Points explores the push to bring tourism to unlikely destinations around the world, as well as the political, economic, and diplomatic factors that drive governments to create—or revive—tourist traps.—Chloe Hadavas
Police officers guard a new laser and water show in the old town of Kashgar, in Xinjiang, China, on June 30, 2017.Kevin Frayer/Getty Images
China Is Turning a Crushed Xinjiang Into a Tourist Trap
After years of human rights abuses, Beijing wants Han visitors in the region, Eva Xiao writes.
A G-20 logo is seen on a boat in Dal Lake ahead of the G-20 meeting in Srinagar, India, on May 19.Tauseef Mustafa/AFP via Getty Images
Modi Wants to Bring Tourists Back to Kashmir
India’s government wants to turn the war-torn region into a renewed tourist hot spot, David Lepeska writes.
Green cladding surrounds the Ghazanchetsots, an Armenian Apostolic cathedral damaged in the war, during construction on the building in Shusha on Sept. 25, 2021.Emre Caylak photo for Foreign Policy
From the Ruins of War, a Tourist Resort Emerges
Shusha was the key to the recent war between Azerbaijan and Armenia. Now Baku wants to turn the fabled fortress town into a resort, Liz Cookman writes.
Cheryl L. Reed, the author, stands on the nuclear bomb test fields in Kazakhstan on Sept. 13, 2022, wearing a hazmat suit as protection against radiation.Cheryl L. Reed for Foreign Policy
Can Kazakhstan Bury Its Nuclear Past?
Forgetting the site where Russia became a nuclear power comes with its own risks, Cheryl L. Reed writes.
A man visiting the Hejaz train station near al-Ula, Saudi Arabia, on Jan. 4, 2019.Fayez Nureldine/AFP/Getty Images
The Other Magic Kingdom
Saudi Arabia is making a very risky bet that it can become an international tourist destination, Adam Baron writes.
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