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Foreign tourists drops 14.1%
26/09/2009

The number of foreign tourists visiting Thailand over the first eight months of this year went down 14.1 per cent from the same period last year to only 8.9 million, deputy spokesman of the Democrat Party, Atthawit Suwanphakdee, said on Saturday.

Mr Athhawat attributed the declining to impacts of the Songkran riots by the anti-government red-shirts in April and the pandemic of the A (H1N1) flu virus.

However, he was confident that the situation of the tourism sector will improve in the fourth quarter of the year as the number of foreign arrivals is increasing.

He called on both the red and yellow-shirt people groups to think of the country and refrain from rallies that could worsen the country’s ailing economy.

bangkokpost.com

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