Work is underway to increase the flow of tourists between Azerbaijan and Turkiye, Nadir Alpaslan, Deputy Minister of Culture and Tourism of Turkiye, who is on a visit to Baku, told journalists, Report informs.
He said that the number of tourists from Azerbaijan to Turkiye has exceeded 500,000 since the beginning of this year:
"We are still close to the indicators of 2019. We aim to increase the Azerbaijani tourists visiting our country to more than one million in a short period. Of course, this is not one-sided, we are discussing what measures can be taken to increase the number of people visiting Azerbaijan from Turkiye. In this sense, it is crucial to make travel more convenient and accessible. Currently, Turkish Airlines operates about 30 weekly flights between the two countries. It is essential to increase it further. Pegasus Airlines and AZAL also work in this direction. There are flights not only to Baku but also to Ganja and Nakhchivan. Increasing these flights, including making the price and comfort more favorable, is very important in terms of increasing travel between the two countries."
According to him, Azerbaijan is interested in Turkish holiday regions, especially Antalya and Bodrum.
Alpaslan believes that Azerbaijan has a robust event tourism infrastructure:
"I think the number of visits between the two countries will increase thanks to joint propaganda."
The deputy minister noted that it is also important that Shusha was declared the cultural capital of the Turkic world in 2023: "In this context, the number of citizens who want to travel to this region from our country, especially after the Karabakh victory, is quite large. These trips will increase significantly if the necessary comfort is provided in this sense."