17:46 - 8.01.2018

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January 8, Fineko/abc.az. The Ministry of Culture & Tourism of Azerbaijan reports a 20% rise in the number of foreign citizens in the country for the past year.

The Ministry reports that in 2017 the number of visitors to the country increased by 449,215 or 20% up to 2,691,998 compared with 2016.

"Of them, 853,082 persons are citizens of Russia, 537,710 – Georgia, 362,597 – Iran, 301 553 – Turkey, 102,360 – UAE, 62,454 – Iraq, 57,756 – Ukraine, 33,273 – Saudi Arabia and 381,213 from other countries. Foreign nationals came most in July – 313 515 people," the MCTA said.

Azerbaijan is visited mainly by citizens of Russia (31.6%), Georgia (19.9%), Iran (13.4%), Turkey (11.2%), and the UAE (3.8%).

"Compared to 2016, the number of visitors from Saudi Arabia increased by 4.5 times, Oman 7.4-fold, UAE 1.9-fold, Iran – 1.4-fold, India 2.3-fold, but the number of visitors from Turkey declined by 11,790 people. There is also growing flow of people from Europe, the Persian Gulf and the Middle East, Asia, Africa and the U.S.," the MCTA said.