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Karabakh Reports Further Growth In Tourism

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  • Karabakh Reports Further Growth In Tourism

    KARABAKH REPORTS FURTHER GROWTH IN TOURISM

    14:54 21/08/2013 " SOCIETY

    The number of foreign tourists visiting Nagorno-Karabakh Republic is
    continuing to increase rapidly after substantial growth recorded in
    recent years, Karabakh authorities have said, according to Asbarez.com.

    Official figures released by the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic's Tourism
    Department show a doubling of visitors in the first quarter of
    this year.

    According to the department, some 16,000 tourists from 86 nations
    visited Karabakh last year, up by 40 percent from 2011. They spent
    an estimated $6 million on accommodation, food and services.

    These figures do not include residents of Armenia, who also appear
    to be traveling to Karabakh in larger numbers these days.

    The authorities in Stepanakert had reported similar annual growth since
    2007 when the official number of non-Armenian tourists stood at around
    5,000. The tourism sector's expansion is evidenced by the emergence of
    new hotels and guesthouses not only in Stepanakert but also in Shushi.

    Sergey Shahverdian, the head of the Tourism Department, said the
    growing influx shows that the NKR leadership is succeeding in promoting
    the once war-ravaged disputed territory as a tourist destination
    despite Azerbaijani obstruction.

    "The state is implementing a coordinated policy on tourism," he told
    RFE/RL's Armenian service (Azatutyun.am). "That includes forming a
    favorable image of the Nagorno-Karabakh Republic in targeted tourist
    markets through special brochures and promotional articles in various
    authoritative publications."

    "The other direction of our efforts is to create more comfortable
    conditions for visiting tourists," Shahverdian said. That means not
    only upgrading the local tourism infrastructure but also exposing
    foreigners to more historical sites in Karabakh, he said.

    Karabakh's main tourist attractions are mountainous scenery, medieval
    Armenian monasteries as well as a cave complex thought to be the site
    of one of the most ancient proto-human habitations in Eurasia. They
    are located several dozen kilometers away from the heavily militarized
    "line of contact" separating Karabakh and Azerbaijani armies.

    "I thought that Karabakh is a small place like a village, but this
    place is much bigger. I didn't expect to see so much natural beauty
    here," one tourist, an Armenian man from Kuwait, said as he spent
    time in a Stepanakert cafe with several other Kuwaiti Armenians.

    "As you know, Kuwait is a desert country," said one of them. "There
    are practically no green areas there. People living there don't see
    so much greenery and so many mountains."

    The Azerbaijani authorities regard private or business trips to
    Karabakh not authorized by them. More than 300 foreign dignitaries and
    ordinary visitors have been declared personae non gratae in Azerbaijan
    for ignoring these warnings. The Azerbaijani Foreign Ministry released
    their updated blacklist earlier this month.

    Source: Panorama.am

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