The number of tourists to China 's Macao Special Administrative Region reached a total of 1.05 million in August, hitting a monthly record in official tallies and exceeding one million for the first time.

According to the Statistics and Census Services, the figure went up 17.2 percent from a year ago.

Hong Kong became the largest tourist source for Macao. The number of tourists from Hong Kong, China's inland, Taiwan and Japan accounted for 51.2 percent, 30.8 percent, 12.6 percent and 1. 3 percent, respectively, of the total.

Statistics show that Macao received a total of 6.92 million tourists in the first eight months of this year, up 13.1 percent on an annual basis.

(Xinhua 09/14/2001)