Istanbul hosts over 9M foreign tourists in Jan-Oct

ANKARA

More than 9 million foreign tourists visited Istanbul in first ten months of the current year, according to Ministry of Culture and Tourism.

The ministry released on Wednesday a report revealing statistics of foreigners that visited Istanbul in January and October.

The report is based on data collected from Ataturk and Sabiha Gokcen airports, as well as Istanbul ports of Haydarpasa, Pendik, Tuzla, Zeytinburnu, and Karakoy.

Accordingly, Istanbul hosted 9,120,248 foreign tourists in first ten months of the year, up by 16 percent compared to the same period of 2016.

Germans topped the list with 862,453 people, followed by 734,739 Iranians. As many as 505,487 Saudi tourists visited Istanbul in the first ten months.

Russia stood fifth in the list with 407,771 tourists, with 64.6 percent rise compared to the same period last year. The number of Chinese tourists increased 35.3 percent with more than 170,000 people, which were nearly 128,000 in 2016.

The report also revealed that the tourists from Arab countries made nearly 25 percent of the total foreigners -- more than 2.27 million. It said 25 percent increase in tourists from Arab countries was reported compared to first 10 months of 2016.

The report also said that Ataturk Airport hosted more than 7 million foreign visitors, while Sabiha Gokcen Airport received 2 million.

Reporting by Burcu by Cansu Dikme