ERBIL, Kurdistan Region – More than 140,000 tourists have visited the Kurdistan Region for the Ramadan holidays, an increase in numbers for the second-straight year, the region’s Tourism Board said in a statement Tuesday.
“We are expecting that this number to increase significantly, and hit a record this Eid,” a statement from the board read.
It stated the figures are only for four days — Friday until Monday — and that they will release the final figures next week.
It said that the high number of tourists comes as the result of some new tourism projects in different parts of the Region and a marketing strategy targeting more tourists to consider spending their holiday in Kurdistan.
It did not give details about the nationality of the tourists, but it is highly expected that the majority come from Iraq’s south and center as they seek cooler temperatures in the summer and the relative safety of the Kurdistan Region.
Eid al-Fitr, which marks the end of the holy month of Ramadan, began on Sunday in Kurdistan Region.
According to last year’s figures, two days into the holiday the number of tourists was more than 108,000.
Kurdistan Region held the Middle East Tourism Expo 2017 in Erbil in May as part of a long-term government plan to attract vacationers.
Authorities said then that they have planned to spend an estimated $100 million in the coming years to revive and develop an industry that is likely to generate jobs and incomes for the heavily oil-dependent nation.
According to the tourism board as of May, around 1.6 million holidaymakers visited the region in 2017, 23 percent of whom traveled from regional countries.
The end of the fasting month of Ramadan is usually celebrated with a week of holiday festivities in most Muslim nations. Although the Kurdistan Region attracted thousands of sightseers from neighboring countries, the war with ISIS and the stagnation of the Kurdish economy still deterred a large number of foreign tourists from visiting.
In 2015 as the Region went through severe economic crises and internal political turmoil, just 30,000 tourists chose to come to Kurdish destinations in Iraq, according to the board.
Some of the tourists come through tourism companies in big groups with week-long programs to visit Kurdistan’s spectacular mountainous areas and waterfalls.
The Kurdish region has put in place a number of strict checkpoints between the Kurdistan Region and the rest of Iraq along with tightened security since the rise of ISIS about three years ago.
Nawar Hamid, an Iraqi trip organizer who brought Iraqi tourists to Erbil for the holidays told Rudaw this week that crossing the many checkpoints to Erbil — some imposed by the Kurdish security — was easier this year compared to last year.
