The rest of the group which included five South Africans, three Britons, and one person from India, were believed to still be detained. Five South Africans rounded up along with the others also expected to be deported.

Gift of the Givers, a humanitarian relief organisation based in South Africa, said none of the group had been charged.

“The other nine are being held without charge at a detention centre on the accusation that they were watching propaganda videos”.

A group of tourists, including nine Britons, who were arrested in China six days ago are suspected of distributing terrorist videos, officials in northern China have said. A relative of one of the detainees told reporters that the group had watched a Genghis Khan documentary a few nights ago and are baffled as to why they have been detained.

Twenty South African, British and Indian nationals were held on July 10 at an airport in Erdos, Inner Mongolia, about 700 kilometers (435 miles) west of Beijing.

In a notice issued in 2014, the Muslim-dominated Xinjiang province’s government banned sending, copying, reposting, uploading, playing and storing of terror-related videos and those violating the rules faced detention and criminal liabilities.

According to an article by News24, all 10 of the South Africans arrested in China should be home by the end of the weekend.

But commentators said the travelers had likely gained access to narratives about the regions they were traveling through that went against the official ruling Chinese Communist Party line.

Sooliman said nine members of the group were accused of watching terror propaganda in their hotel rooms and that they would continue to be detained.

On Tuesday, the Department of worldwide Relations and Cooperation (DIRCO) confirmed that a group of South Africans were arrested in China.

“Foreign tourists have been detained by the police here, I heard they looked at and propagated something about violence and terrorism”, Zhang Xi, an official at Ordos’s foreign affairs office, told AFP on Thursday.

He added: “Our consular staff have visited the group and have received assurances from the Chinese government about their health and treatment”.

“We are in active touch, have sought facts from the Chinese authorities for consular access”.