The much delayed memorandum of understanding to open Nepal for the first time to Chinese tourists will now be signed in the second week of November.

The understanding is likely to be signed on November 9 or 10 this year,” Chief Executive Officer Pradeep Raj Pandey of the Nepal Tourism Board told The Rising Nepal Tuesday.

Nepal and China signed an agreement in Beijing earlier this year officially putting Nepal on a list of 12 countries for outbound Chinese tourists. Chinese arrivals have been delayed in the absence of a follow-up agreement.

The accord is important to diversify arrivals with declining tourist arrivals as the tourism industry has been hit by a series of crises following the 1999 Christmas eve hijacking of an Indian Airlines Airbus

on a regular flight to New Delhi from Kathmandu by suspected Kashmiri militants.