Ankara promises to Moscow to follow its tourist safety requirements — Presidential aide

Turkey has issued written guarantees it will painstakingly follow all of Russia’s recommendations regarding measures to guarantee the safety of Russian vacationers, Russian presidential aide, Yuri Ushakov, has told the media. Also, Turkey agreed to receive a group of Russian specialists to discuss the issue. According to the Kremlin official, the resumption of charter flights between the two countries will be discussed when Russian President Vladimir Putin and his Turkish counterpart Recep Tayyip Erdogan will meet in St. Petersburg on August 9. "Turkey has guaranteed in writing it will comply with Russia’s recommendations concerning extra security measures to make the holidays of Russian tourists at its resorts safe," Ushakov said, adding that Ankara had given its preliminary consent to let Russian experts see on site what Turkey was doing to enhance holiday makers’ safety. Ushakov recalled that tourism was a major component of bilateral cooperation. In 2015 3.6 million Russian holiday-makers visited Turkey, and a year earlier, 4.4 million did so. In January-April this year Russian tourist traffic to Turkey slumped to 97,000. "Turkey in the first half of this year missed 840 million dollars as the Russian tourist flow ran dry," the Kremlin official said. According to Ushakov, Putin and Erdogan will discuss wider contacts in education, science, culture and the arts. He recalled that the Russian center of science and culture had been open in Ankara since February 2014 and Russia would be prepared to consider the opening of the Yunus Emre Turkish Culture Center in Moscow.