Official announcement of the cancellation of Cometan's trip to China that had been scheduled for August 2020.

Since late 2019, the Founder of Astronism has been planning a private visitation to the People's Republic of China for August 2020 following his first visitation to the country in April 2018. The trip had planned to cover the cities of Chongqing, the ancient capital of Xian, Hubei province (the province where COVID-19 originated), and the city of Shanghai on China's eastern coast. Cometan had been hoping to gain further knowledge and experience of Chinese religion, culture, and society while on this cross-country visitation. This trip was intended to be a private visitation of Cometan to the country with some of his closest friends whom are themselves Chinese nationals. Following the outbreak of the Coronavirus global pandemic from Wuhan, Cometan's visitation was placed in jeopardy while no official statement had been published by the Astronist Institution regarding the trip.

Today, however, the Office of Communications can now confirm that this visitation has been cancelled and beyond this, Cometan will not be travelling to the People's Republic of China for the foreseeable future. This decision has been reached following significant ethical concerns due to the reopening of some of China's wet markets. Cometan and the Astronist Institution condemn the trading of wild, exotic and endangered animals which many of these wet markets are known for and which likely lead to the pandemic the world is currently enduring. As such, Cometan has taken the decision to cancel all upcoming plans to visit Mainland China. The Astronist Institution will also be taking measures to gather information about other key players in the global trade of exotic and endangered animals which may result in similar decisions in the future.

In addition to this, China's treatment of religion and the political situations taking place in both Hong Kong and Taiwan have raised concerns within the Institution for a considerable amount of time. Statements on the official position of the Astronist Institution regarding these issues of concern will be published in due course.

Resources:
– https://www.vox.com/future-perfect/2020/4/15/21219222/coronavirus-china-ban-wet-markets-reopening
– https://www.washingtonpost.com/business/china-is-reopening-its-wet-markets-thats-good/2020/04/03/6c12a474-7610-11ea-ad9b-254ec99993bc_story.html
– https://www.zmescience.com/science/wet-markets-coronavirus-06042020/

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Office of Communications of the Astronist Institution
For more information, visit the website of the Astronist Institution – www.astronia.org