The Directorate of Culture and Tourism in the Turkish city of Istanbul announced that the number of tourists arriving in the city reached 5.5 million during the first five months of 2019, an increase of 11% compared with the same period last year. Germans topped the list of visitors with 395,000 German tourists, followed by Iranians and Russians.
According to the website of the Turkish newspaper Hürriyet Daily News, Istanbul received about one million tourists in May alone, an increase of 3.3% compared with the same month in 2018.
The website noted that the Turkish tourist destination received 12.8 million tourists from January to May 2019, compared with 11.5 million in the same period last year.
In a related context, a statement issued by the office of Istanbul Governor Ali Yerlikaya said they are on their way to achieving their target of hosting 15 million tourists by the end of 2019, noting that the world-class level of services and capacity of the city's hotels, as well as the newly opened Istanbul Airport, have strengthened the city's position in its quest to be among the top 3 tourist destinations in the world.
The website stated that the report issued by the local tourism authority showed that the number of tourists who visited Istanbul in the first five months of 2019 is the highest recorded for that period in the past five years.
The impact of this increase has been clearly visible at a number of tourist attractions in Istanbul, most notably the Grand Bazaar in the Fatih district, which is considered the oldest bazaar in the world and is seeing a noticeable increase in visitors, especially from the Far East and the Middle East, after being in a critical situation due to the drop in the number of foreign tourists two years ago, according to a report by the "Daily Sabah" website.
