Baku, Azerbaijan, Nov. 6
By Anvar Mammadov - Trend:
The Azerbaijani Ministry of Culture and Tourism has not recommended that local travel agencies suspend selling tours to Egypt in connection with the Russian Airbus A321 crash, Nahid Bahirov, the head of the Azerbaijan Tourism Association, told Trend Nov. 6.
"Taking into account that the aircraft crash, according to the preliminary official version, was not caused by a terrorist act, the ministry has not recommended suspending selling tours in this direction," he said. "Only in case of a terrorist attack or political instability in a country, will the ministry not recommend selling tours to a country."
Bahirov said that trips to Egypt, in general, and Sharm el-Sheikh, in particular, are very popular, not only in Azerbaijan, but among travelers worldwide.
Bahirov noted that despite the plane crash, Russian tourists still prefer visiting Egypt by plane.
"These tours are still in demand, in spite of the plane crash," said an official at R & R Travel agency.
"After the crash, the number of people willing to go to Egypt declined, but the interest still remains," sales manager of the company Sura Muradova told Trend. "In addition, we received no messages from the Ministry of Culture and Tourism of Azerbaijan that trips to Egypt are unsafe. In case we receive such a message, we will offer our customers other destinations, explaining the reason for such a decision."
She also said that tours to Egypt are mainly offered from Tbilisi, as there are no direct flights from Baku to Egypt.
Azerbaijan Airlines CJSC (AZAL) told Trend that the company cannot be responsible for the safety of flights over Egypt, since they do not fly to that country.
"We don't have direct flights to Egypt," an AZAL official said, noting that the company has no plans to open a direct flight to Egypt in the near future. "There are direct flights to Istanbul and Dubai from Baku, from where tourists can fly to Egypt. Accordingly, AZAL is responsible for the safety of flights only to those destinations."
An A321 passenger jet of Russia's Kogalymavia air carrier (flight 9268) bound to St. Petersburg crashed on October 31 some 30 minutes after the takeoff from Egypt's Sharm el-Sheikh. It fell down 100 kilometers south of the administrative center of North Sinai Governorate, the city of Al-Arish. The plane was carrying 217 passengers and seven crew members. There were four Ukrainian and one Belarusian nationals among the passengers. None survived.