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Russia completes tourist evacuation from Egypt after airliner crash

Xinhua, December 4, 2015 Adjust font size:

Russia has finished evacuating its tourists from Egypt following a bomb attack on a Russian A321 airliner in October, the Emergency Situations Ministry said Friday.

"Since the suspension of air links with Egypt, 36 aircraft of the Emergency Situations Ministry, the Defense Ministry and Volga-Dnepr Airlines have transported more than 89,000 people and delivered almost 780 tons of their personal belongings," the ministry said in a statement.

Russian President Vladimir Putin ordered on Nov. 6 to suspend all scheduled flights to Egypt after the Russian plane travelling from the Red Sea resort of Sharm el-Sheikh to Russia's St. Petersburg crashed on the Sinai Peninsula on Oct. 31, killing all 224 people on board.

As the Islamic State (IS) extremist group claimed responsibility for the crash as a revenge for Russia's airstrikes against IS targets in Syria, the Russian Federal Security Service announced on Nov. 17 that the plane was brought down by a bomb.

Since the flight suspension, Moscow has sent special flights to bring home tourists stranded in Egypt, while empty planes have been organized to carry their luggage separately.

Egypt was Russians' main tourist destination this year, according to the Russian federal tourism agency Rostourism.

Russian Transport Minister Maxim Sokolov said Friday that flights to Egypt could restart after Egypt drastically upgraded security measures guaranteeing the safety of Russian travelers.

However, "it will definitely not happen this year," Interfax news agency quoted Sokolov as saying.

In a separate statement, the Russian Tour Operators' Association said the number of Russian tourists choosing the second most popular destination, Turkey, has started declining.

A senior official at the tourism agency estimated that the passengers flow to Turkey from Russia will plunge by 70 percent due to the travel restriction imposed after the downing of a Russian warplane by the Turkish air force on Nov. 24.

A decree signed last week by Putin banned package tour sales and charter flights to Turkey, except flights meant to evacuate Russian citizens, while regular flights by Russian and Turkish airlines were not affected.

Statistics from Rostourism showed that over 1 million Russian tourists visited Turkey in the first half of 2015. Endi