Kurdistan
Families celebrate Newroz in the Kurdistan Region's Akre, on March 20, 2022. Photo: Alannah Travers/Rudaw
ERBIL, Kurdistan Region - Tourists from within Iraq and other countries have made over 1.7 million visits to different areas across the Kurdistan Region in the first four months of 2022, officials from the Region’s tourism department told Rudaw on Tuesday.
According to data provided to Rudaw by Erbil’s tourism department, 671,146 tourists visited the province in the first four months of 2022, out of which, around 100,000 came from outside Iraq, and the rest were Iraqis.
Both Sulaimani and Duhok provinces hosted over 500,000 tourists each during the four months, meaning that the Region’s provinces saw a total footfall of over 1.7 million visitors.
“From the first day of Eid until the following ten days, we expect 4,000 tourists to enter the province daily, which will total up to 40,000 tourists in those days,” Rewan Mohammed, spokesperson for Duhok’s tourism directorate told Rudaw.
Tourism in the Kurdistan Region has been a booming sector in recent years, but it was hit by coronavirus-related measures in 2020.
The sector has once again blossomed over the past year.
More than four million tourists visited the Kurdistan Region’s provinces in 2021, with the capital city of Erbil receiving the lion’s share.
Ahead of Newroz celebrations in March, hundreds of thousands of tourists traveled to different cities in the Kurdistan Region.
Having a more moderate temperature in the hotter months, the Region’s provinces are often flooded by tourists from other hotter areas of Iraq.
Over 75,000 tourists from Iraq’s southern and central provinces visited Kurdistan Region’s capital city of Erbil to celebrate the start of the 2022 New Year.
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