Germany may have loosen its border restrictions with its southern European neighbors but Turkey will be the summer vacation hub for Germans as it successfully battled the coronavirus while hardest-hit southern European countries still poses high infection risks.
Turkish Foreign Minister Mevlut Cavusoglu held a phone conversation with his German counterpart, Heiko Mass whom is known for not being a big fan of Turkey. However, after the talk, German Foreign Ministry posted a tweet to inform about the subjects of the phone conversation. “We are hoping that Turkey would become a vacation hub for Turkey once again,” Maas was quoted. German Foreign Minister’s open statement would certainly prompt millions of Germans to choose Turkey as the vacation spot this summer.
Germany has recently eased its border restrictions with southern European countries to get the business going as the German economy was reported to face up to 10 percent contraction in 2020 due to coronavirus. However, German government may not be preferring European countries as summer vacation destinations for its citizens as the infection and death numbers are still high in Spain, France and Italy. But millions of Germans are eager to finally go on a vacation.
A lot of Germans have already booked plane tickets and hotels in Turkey as Turkey’s flag carrier Turkish Airlines started selling tickets online for after June 15th. 26 years old Melike Memis who is a German citizen from Cologne is one of them. Memis says since Turkey has less fatality comparing to Europe, she would be less worried vacationing there than somewhere else.
The official statement from both sides after the phone conversation underlined that the two countries would be in close contact in the upcoming days to lay out a plan for the summer. Turkey has already started coronavirus-adapted projects to lure tourists this summer. One of them is corona-free certification project of Turkish Tourism Ministry.
Turkey generated nearly $35 billion tourism revenue in 2019 a 17 percent increase from the previous year.
