Turkish government aims to attract at least 50 million tourists annually for 2023, the centennial of the founding of modern Turkey, said country's European Union minister and chief negotiator for accession talks Anadolu Agedcny reported.
Mevlut Cavusoglu said Turkey had welcomed around 35 million foreign tourists in 2013, during an international travel fair taking place on Wednesday in Berlin, Germany.
The Turkish minister also said a readmission agreement signed in December 2013 by Turkey and the EU, which is expected to allow Turkish people visa-free travel in the Schengen area -- a grouping of 26 European countries that allows citizens to cross shared borders without internal checks -- will bear positive results in the future. According to the agreement, the European Union will send back to Turkey migrants who entered the 28-nation bloc illegally via the EU-hopeful country.
Turkey became the world's sixth most popular tourist destination in 2013, according to the Office of the Turkish Culture and Tourism Information Attaché in New York City.