Hong Kong members of the national legislature planning a trip to Xinjiang this month have been told their visit will have to be postponed in light of a recent coronavirus outbreak in the autonomous region.

Tam Yiu-chung, Hong Kong’s sole delegate to China’s top legislative body, the National People’s Congress (NPC) Standing Committee, on Wednesday said: “We were informed that the visit will have to be rescheduled because the epidemic situation has been fluctuating there.”

About 20 of the city’s 36 deputies to the NPC had planned to visit Xinjiang, a source of friction between Beijing and the West, to better understand human rights conditions and local governance in mainland China’s northwestern region.

Tam Yiu-chung says a new date for the trip is not known.

The members were meant to leave on Friday for a week of quarantine across the border in Shenzhen before flying to Xinjiang for a five- to six-day trip.

Tam added: “A new date is unknown. It is hoped that we can travel there this time. It was done online last year.”

Local NPC deputies usually arrange a visit to at least one mainland province or region every year to learn more about local social and economic developments.

Between 2014 and 2019, teams visited the provinces of Sichuan, Hubei, Zhejiang and Hainan, among other places. The trip was called off in 2020 due to the Covid-19 pandemic, and meetings with Xinjiang officials were held online last year.

Xinjiang recently experienced a fresh wave of Covid-19 infections. Since the first case was found on July 30, the region has seen at least 12 counties in seven prefectures hit by the coronavirus.

Xinjiang has been a persistent source of tension between China and the West in recent years. The West claims China has locked up millions of Muslim Uygurs and members of other ethnic minority groups in re-education camps.

In June, the European Parliament adopted a position stating that human rights abuses in Xinjiang posed a “serious risk of genocide”.

Beijing has repeatedly denied the claims and maintains there has been no human rights abuse.

Last week, China’s Ministry of Foreign Affairs organised a visit to Xinjiang for a delegation of diplomats from 30 Islamic countries.

According to a subsequent press statement by the foreign ministry, delegation members spoke highly of the Chinese government’s policies in Xinjiang and were satisfied the region had achieved great results in economic development, ethnic solidarity, and freedom of religious belief, while various rights of Muslims were also guaranteed.