The best markets for tourists were Russia, Israel, Ukraine, Greece, Poland and the U.K.

The department of statistics said on Monday that a total of 184,159 tourist arrivals were recorded in June this year, compared to 9,119 at the peak of global lockdowns in June 2020, when measures were implemented in Cyprus to prevent the spread of the Covid-19 pandemic.

According to these measures, there had been a ban of entry to the Republic on several categories of persons, including tourists, up to June 8, 2020.

Compared to June 2019 (when 509,662 arrivals were recorded), there was a decrease of 63.9%, Cystat said.

For the six-month period of January to June this year, tourist arrivals totaled 340,984 compared to 255,675 in the corresponding period of 2020, an increase of 33.4%, and a decrease of 79.1% compared to the January-June 2019 period with 1,631,023 arrivals.

Arrivals from Russia were the main source of tourism for June this year, with 84,400 and a share of 45.8% of all arrivals, followed by Israel with 7.4% (13,553), Ukraine with 6.5% (11,991), Greece with 5.5% (10,209), Poland with 5.0% (9,260) and the United Kingdom with 4.2% and 7,700 arrivals.

The majority or 82,8% of arrivals declared ‘holidays’ as the purpose of their trip in June, for 10.9% said they were visiting friends and relatives, and for 6.3% it was ‘business’.

Comparatively, 42.6% of arrivals in June last year said they visited for holidays, 28% visited friends or relatives and 29.4% were here for business reasons.

Source: Financial Mirror