Malé, Maldives — Velana International Airport (VIA) has reported a record number of tourist arrivals on Sunday.
While the boarders of the Maldives opened on July 15 after nearly four months of closure, the number of tourist arrivals has continued to increase gradually.
The Terminal Operation’s General of VIA, Ibrahim Hussain stated that, while a total of 871 passengers had arrived to the Maldives on Sunday, 809 passengers had departed from the country. There were 851 tourist arrivals recorded on the last Sunday.
According to the officials of VIA, most arrivals are seen during Fridays and Sundays.
It is estimated that over 330 tourists arrived from the Russian airlines Aeroflot. Hussain revealed that as flights from this airline had restarted, a rise in the number of tourist arrivals was noticed.
Although the tourist arrivals since the boarder reopened have not been as high as predicted, the newly appointed Tourism Minister, Dr. Abdulla Mausoom recently stated that the number is expected to reach 120,000 by December.
Maldives had reported a record breaking 1.7 million tourist arrivals in 2019, making the target for 2020 to be two million. However, due to the unexpected pandemic, the number was first reduced to 850,000 and now to about 120,000 tourist arrivals.
