Greece wants British tourists to return after gradually easing restrictions

So far, the UK has placed Greece on the ‘amber travel list,’ meaning Britons returning home from Greece must undergo a quarantine of at least five days.

Tourists visit the Parthenon at the Acropolis archaeological site in Athens, Greece. (Source: Reuters) In order to attract tourists back to the beautiful islands, Greece has sent the country’s Tourism Minister Harry Theoharis 3 days to the UK to convince one of the biggest tourist markets of “ The land of myths .” According to the announcement of Greece, Minister Theoharis will meet with British Foreign Secretary Nigel Adams to discuss the tourism market in the context that Greece is gradually easing travel restrictions. It is expected that Mr. Theoharis will also work with British Airways, EasyJet and Jet2 – airlines that have regular flights to Greece. In 2019, before the COVID-19 pandemic occurred, there were about 3.5 million British tourists on vacation in Greece and now the country wants to attract visitors from “The Land of the Mist”. blind” returns to the beautiful Greek islands in the coming months after gradually easing restrictions and blockade measures that have been imposed for months to combat the COVID-19 epidemic. Tourism contributes a quarter of the Greek government’s annual revenue, and Athens wants to convince tour operators that the country is safe to visit. Earlier, on May 10, Greek Prime Minister Kyriakos Mitsotakis, after talks with his Spanish counterpart Pedro Sanchez, emphasized that Athens is one of the first capitals of the EU, along with Madrid, to support the idea of ​​a “vaccination certificate” to allow the resumption of tourism. Despite imposing a partial blockade since November 7 last year, Greece is still recording more than 1,500 cases COVID-19 /day, mainly in Athens, in which there are dozens of deaths and hospitals are always overloaded. In order to restart tourism, which has fallen into stagnation, since the beginning of April, the country has gradually reopened non-essential shops and cafes. On May 10, all schools were allowed to reopen after 6 months of closure. Under the new rules, students and teachers will have to self-test for the virus twice a week. Nearly a month ago, the 7-day quarantine rule was lifted for all visitors from the EU, the US, UK , Israel, Serbia, United Arab Emirates and some other countries. However, the UK has so far ranked Greece on the “amber travel list,” meaning Britons returning home from Greece must undergo at least five days of quarantine. At the highest level, the “travel red list” requires returnees to be isolated for 10 days.