Türkiye has a well-developed and advanced health system, offering experience in the sector that can be useful for the UAE, according to the Emirati envoy to Ankara.

The UAE is keen to utilize Turkish expertise in the health sector, Ambassador Saeed Thani Hareb Al Dhaheri told Anadolu at the Health Tourism Expo in Istanbul on Thursday.

Both our countries have a developed healthcare system and our collective experience in the field is helpful for the region, he said.

Türkiye hosts tens of millions of foreign tourists every year, including people coming in for the medical facilities. The number of medical tourists reached 1.2 million last year.

“There is a very good number for health tourism (between UAE and Türkiye). In total, we have 140,000 people coming for tourism (to Türkiye),” said Al Dhaheri.

On bilateral ties, the envoy said relations are growing and reaching ever higher levels, especially due to recent top-level bilateral visits.

President Recep Tayyip Erdogan visited the UAE in July, while Emirati leader Sheikh Mohamed bin Zayed Al Nahyan was in Türkiye in June 2022.

Türkiye is among the UAE’s top 10 commercial partners, and the two sides have signed several new financial and economic cooperation deals over the past two years.

“So this is an indicator of the relations between the two countries and the aspect of investments and economy,” Al Dhaheri said.

He said the two countries want to further develop their business ties, adding that their respective companies are very enthusiastic for progress on that front.

There are different areas with potential for investors of both countries, including technology, artificial intelligence, renewable energy, and space, Al Dhaheri added.

PM, tourism minister: Results of tourist season so far excellent

ZAGREB, 17 AugВ (Hina) – The course of the 2023 tourist season so far is excellent, with 14.1 million travellers and 74.5 million overnight stays having been registered since the start of the year, 8% and 3% more than in the same period of 2022, Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic said at a government session on Thursday.

As for this year’sВ pre-season, Plenkovic said that it was one of the best, having also positively affected destinations in the country’s interior, which have reported 800,000 arrivals and 1.7 million overnight stays, 16% and 15% more than in 2022.

The prime minister also noted that the number of domestic visitorsВ was 15% higher than in the same period of 2022, while the number of overnight stays made by those guests was the same as in 2022.

Tourism and Sports MinisterВ Nikolina Brnjac said after the government session that she was satisfied with the results of the tourist season and that the number of arrivals in August was the same as in August 2019 while in July it was 2% higher than in July 2019.

Asked by reporters if she thought that the results of the peak season were not as good as expected, she said that she did not and that the number of guestsВ was the same as in 2019.

Brnjac believes the new tourism law will contribute to a larger number of hotels.

In a comment on reports that the increase in hotel prices in July was twice the inflation rate, Brnjac said hotel prices were now close to those in rival countries.

She added that hotels that had made investments had the right to increase their prices while those that had not but had increased their prices had no justification for it.

“It is difficult to say how priceВ increases are related to occupancy during the peakВ season because hotels have good occupancy rates and are satisfied, and camping sites have better results than in 2019,” she said.

Asked about a warning by the British authorities to British tourists visiting Croatia to beware of possible sexual assaults by taxi drivers, Brnjac said that Croatia was one of the safest EU countries, also according to Eurostat data.

“The Ministry of the Interior has been taking the necessary measures in cooperation with the Tourism Ministry, patrolsВ and other services as well as other EU members, and I think there are no grounds (for the warning), but one should report any such incident,” she said.

Brnjac also said that she had been in touch with his Greek counterpart following recent football fan violence in Athens involving Croatian and Greek football supporters in which a 29-year-old Greek was killed, and that she had expressed condolences to her.