China Olympics tickets sold out

China Olympics tickets sold out


Chinese woman smiles as she holds up her Olympic tickets
Millions of Chinese have bought tickets for the games

The organisers of this year's Olympic Games in China say domestic tickets for events in Beijing and Hong Kong have sold out, state-run media outlets say.

Queues formed at branches of the Bank of China when the third and final batch of tickets went on sale on Monday.

China allocated about three-quarters of the seven million Olympic tickets to its domestic audience.

The rest are being sold overseas through each country's national Olympic Committee.

A total of 1.38 million tickets for 16 sports, including boxing, football, volleyball and basketball, were put on sale both at Bank of China outlets and on the official website.

Tickets for the soccer tournament in co-host cities Shanghai, Shenyang, Tianjin and Qinhuangdao, as well as tickets for equestrian events in Hong Kong, are still available, Xinhua news agency said.

Online sales ran into problems on Monday, despite guarantees that the system had been repaired after earlier glitches led to the dismissal of the ticket centre's director last year.

Buyers complained on blogs and internet chat rooms of being unable to complete purchases, despite being able to log on to the website and select tickets fairly smoothly.