Germany, UK review travel advisories

Subsequent to the successful tourism promotions in France and The Netherlands, Sri Lanka Tourism had further good news in the German and the UK markets. The travel advisory in Germany was reviewed by the authorities.

The earlier 'advice against travelling to Sri Lanka if not essential' has been deleted from the text of the German travel advisory. Director of the Tourist Board Office in Germany Channa Jayasekera said "this would definitely be most encouraging to the tour operators and travel agents selling Sri Lanka, as the earlier advisory led to confusion and was negatively interpreted by the public.

After a stakeholders meeting organised by the Sri Lanka Tourist Board Office in the UK, where our concerns were shared through the Pacific Asia Travel Association's (PATA) UK Chapter, Association of National Tourist Office Representatives (ANTOR) and Association of British Travel Agents (ABTA) to the Foreign and Commonwealth Office (FCO), the FCO has further softened their travel advisory to Sri Lanka.

"The advisory has been reviewed and reissued with an amendment to the Summary and local travel section, where it now states 'we no longer advice against travel to the city of Anuradapura' Director UK and Ireland of the Tourist Board Jean-Marc Flambert said.