Chinese artist Ai Weiwei was recently barred from entering Switzerland after he was unable to produce a visitor’s visa. According to an Instagram post by Ai, he spent the evening of February 10 on a bench at the Zurich airport.
Ai’s Instagram post was captioned with: “‘This is Switzerland, not Portugal’ they told me. I am sleeping on a bench with a blanket tonight, waiting to be deported next morning at 6:50AM.”
The Instagram post included several photos and videos of the airport, his passport, and documents, as well as the notice of refusal of entry at the border. The latter stated Ai did not have a visa.
Chinese passport holders are required to get a Swiss Schengen Visa to visit the country for tourism, business, visiting friends and family, and short study programs.
The artist has been living in the Portuguese city of Montemor-o-Novo, outside Lisbon, since 2013.
In one of the photos Ai uploaded to Instagram, he included the flight number BA709, a British Airways flight scheduled to leave Zurich for London at 6:50 a.m. on February 11.
A spokesperson for the Zurich cantonal police told the Keystone-SDA news agency that Ai did not have the necessary entry documents to visit Switzerland. The police spokesperson also noted Ai was not arrested and was able to move around freely in the airport’s transit area until his return to his country of origin.
The news of the Chinese artist’s refusal for entry into Switzerland was first reported by swissinfo.ch, part of the Swiss Broadcasting Corporation.
