Mass cancellation of booking tours to resorts in Turkey this time was recorded not in Russia, but in popular Greece. A wave of cancellations swept due to the aggravation of the political crisis between the two NATO countries.
The tension on the Ankara-Athens line has also affected the tourism sector. Since the beginning of the political crisis, there has been a decrease in the number of tourists arriving in Turkey from Greece. At the same time, the Turks do not want to give up vacations in the neighboring country and do not massively cancel their travel requests, so the Greek side will not lose this year's income from Turkish vacationers, who will spend about 1 billion euros for the current year.
According to Turkish media, tour operators explain the different reactions of neighbors to the same events as follows: “Greeks are more conservative in this regard. They take immediate action in relation to ongoing political developments. We can understand this in numbers. There is a decrease in the number of tourists coming to Turkey, there is a cancellation of bookings. There are those who make this decision, perhaps for political reasons that they do not consider safe. However, the Turks continue to travel to Greece. It's a matter of choice. Trade and tourism should not stop because of the crisis.”
Help: NATO allies Greece and Turkey have long clashed over a range of historical disputes, including maritime boundaries, the delimitation of their continental shelves, and the status of the divided island of Cyprus. Discontent has been mounting since Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis used a visit to the United States in May to effectively lobby against Ankara's attempts to buy F-16 fighter jets from Washington. Mitsotakis said the Turkish Air Force violates Greek airspace on a daily basis. This prompted Erdogan to say that he no longer recognizes the existence of a Greek prime minister and that the Aegean islands, ceded to Greece by international treaties over a century ago, are “occupied”. In addition, the Turkish authorities are alarmed by the growing cooperation between Greece and the United States in the field of defense and security in recent years. Greece granted the US access to several military bases and renewed mutual defense cooperation in 2021 and, according to Turkey, armed the islands in the Aegean Sea, which must be demilitarized by international law.
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