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The revelation about when Greece will open its borders to tourists was made by the Minister of Tourism Haris Theocharis in an interview with the BBC.
As he pointed out, the purpose is to open them in mid-July. However, this will not be the case for all countries.
The presenter of the BBC bulletin, Martine Croxall, at the beginning of the interview stressed that Greece is an EU member state that has successfully faced the crisis of the coronavirus.
Noting that timely measures had been taken to curb traffic and economic activity. Adding so far Greece has reported just over 2,400 confirmed cases and 121 deaths (yesterday’s figures) to a population of 11 million.
BBC News reported, however, stressed that the Greek economy relies heavily on tourism. The Tourism Minister Haris Theocharis argued that efforts are being made to open the border in July.
Mr Harris Theocharis: stated “It was a very aggressive approach, in a way, in the sense that we were forward-thinking. Our Prime Minister made early decisions not to hold carnival events before we even had victims and we moved very quickly in time to close the curve by closing schools, shops, etc. In combination with this there was a very precise and consistent education-information policy, which explained to the public why we had to implement what was expected to do and how this would help smooth out the curve and achieve our goals. This was very successful and was entrusted to health professionals, who reassured the public.” He then went on to talk about tourism stating, “It is important and, as we successfully deal with the health side of the crisis, we turn our attention to how the sectors of the economy will gradually reopen, without the risk of returning to quarantine. Of course the effect is great. Tourism has stopped. We started the first two months of the year with growth of + 24%. This, of course, has stopped since March, and we hope to be able to implement health procedures, a common set of rules that will allow bilateral or pan-European levels to be able to travel or take some kind of vacation.
When asked how soon our borders will open and welcome tourists again he said “Of course this is something that needs to be discussed with health experts. We are in the process of processing the protocols that will be submitted to the committee of experts and we hope that they will be able to give us their approval to open gradually. We aim to be able to open sometime in July. Of course, this cannot be done for all countries, for all destinations, I recognize that, but at least we should try to open bilateral communication and travel with some countries.”
Watch the video here:-
sourecehttps://www.pronews.gr
