Tunisia wants UK to relax travel warning

Unpublished
LONDON - Tunisian officials have urged the UK government to relax its advice warning against all but essential travel to the country, after a 90% drop in British visitors in the first part of 2016. The guidance has been in place since 31 British holidaymakers were killed in two terror attacks in Tunisia in 2015. The Tunisian ambassador to the UK said the government should take into account security improvements since last year. The Foreign Office said the safety of British nationals was its main concern. Thirty Britons were among 39 killed when a gunman opened fire on tourists in a beach resort near Sousse on Tunisia's Mediterranean coast last June. UK tour operators stopped all package holidays to Tunisia in July following a change in travel advice from the Foreign Office, which still says further terrorist attacks are "highly likely". However, ambassador Nabil Ammar, who himself comes from Sousse, told BBC local radio there was now a gap between the "perception of the level of security, and the real security on the ground". "Every week terrorist cells are dismantled. Terrorists are arrested or neutralised. This should give a positive image, not a negative one. "If you take statistics, you have much less chance to die in Tunisia or to have any harm in Tunisia than so many countries close to us." Mr Ammar said he respected the UK Foreign Office, but it should not allow "the impression that this is not a safe country, and take into account all the progress made" in security. He said he had never seen Tunisia's beaches so empty of tourists, and it was severely hurting the country's economy. "Part of the solution against violence and terrorism is to have a good economy", he said, adding that he wanted the tragedy suffered by both the UK and Tunisia as a result of the terror attacks to "make us two people closer, not separate us at all".(FA)

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