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By Jonathan Chin / CNA Editor
Chinese travel booking platform ctrip.com has removed the Evergreen Laurel Hotel in Shanghai from its listings after the chain’s Paris venue banned the Chinese national flag during the 2024 Summer Olympics, sparking an online uproar.
The story, which had received 110 million views on Sina Weibo, has since been removed from the platform’s list of most popular posts.
On Monday, a Chinese influencer named Instructor Zhang (張教官) accused the Evergreen Laurel Hotel in Paris of rejecting his request to display the Chinese flag at the venue in a video uploaded to TikTok.
Photo: Screenshot from the website of the Evergreen Laurel Hotel in Paris
In the video, a person purporting to be a Chinese chef employed at the hotel can be seen saying that the hotel’s Taiwanese general manager ordered staff to remove a Chinese flag that had previously been flown there.
The video spread like wildfire on Chinese social media, and Sina Weibo briefly listed “Taiwanese manager of Evergreen Laurel Hotel cuts off five-star red flag” as the second most popular search term.
Guoshi Zhitongche (國是直通車), a broadcaster affiliated with China’s state-run Xinhua News Agency, shared the video on Weibo, pointing out that Taiwan and China are listed as the same area in the hotel’s booking system for the Asia region.
In a rare act of restraint, Beijing officials and state media did not comment on the controversy.
When contacted, Evergreen Hotels, which manages the hotels, said the franchise was sorry for not being able to provide the best possible experience to its customers, but added that it was taking steps to ensure all guests were adequately accommodated.
In a separate statement, the franchise in China acknowledged that it had handled the situation “not entirely perfectly” and that the company “does not want the incident to have a negative impact on the goodwill between the peoples across the strait.”
A hotel employee in Shanghai, speaking on condition of anonymity, said ctrip.com appeared to have blocked key terms related to the company, preventing potential customers from accessing its listing on the travel booking site.
The hotel’s official website remains available to the public, it said.
The Central News Agency has independently verified these claims.
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